Across the Divide
by halfmyheart
Summary: An attack on the last Tok'ra base by the System Lords leaves the remaining Tok'ra no choice but to seek sanctuary on Earth. Led by Malek, the remaining Tok'ra flee to the only safe haven they know, but their trials and tribulations are far from over.
1. Prologue: The Agony of Defeat

**Title:** Across the Divide

**Rating:** T

**Pairings**: Malek/OC, Sam/Martouf/Lantash

**Author's notes:** This is a re-write of a much older story entitled "Fading Away" (that is still on this site). I loved the premise, but the story itself needed a LOT of work. So, I decided to revisit this particular part of my past. Here's to hoping this tale is much better the second time around.

**Disclaimer: **All publicly recognizable characters and places are the property of MGM, World Gekko Corp and Double Secret Productions. This form of fan fiction was created for entertainment not monetary purposes and no infringement on copyrights or trademarks was intended. Previously unrecognized characters and places, and this story, are copyrighted to author. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

**Feedback: **All comments welcome.

**Notes: **_-Italics- _denotes host/symbiote communication.

* * *

**Prologue: The Agony of Defeat**

The darkness was nearly absolute. Somewhere in the distance a muffled thud reverberated through the smoky corridors. Shouts and cries of panic filled the empty spaces, crushing what little hope remained. Each cry of alarm that echoed through the hazy tunnels, each shout of pain that issued forth from a fallen comrade, each new body stumbled over in the dark – it all drove home the reality of their present situation with a clarity that bordered on hopeless.

The dire urgency to flee in the opposite direction coursed through the darkened tunnels, a stream of collective unconscious thought bent on nothing more than survival at any cost.

_- We can't leave them. Not here. Not like this.-_

The voice of his host was so small and timid that it barely registered at first. The sadness he felt through their bond nearly sent him crashing into a prone body on the floor as he mentally turned inward in a desperate attempt at comfort. He didn't know what to say or how to begin to comprehend the grief that overwhelmed them both.

He stopped as a tidal wave of anguish and guilt washed over him. Dizzy, he let his hand rest on the smooth crystalline surface of the place he had once called home. The coolness seeped into his palm, calming, yet terribly reminiscent of a world that, until a few short hours before, had been a safe haven.

- _Now it's nothing more than a glorified tomb. -_

Malek leaned forward until his forehead was resting on his hand. He felt the chill from the cool stone leech some of the heat from his face, providing a slight amount of soothing physical comfort in the stifling smoke-filled tunnel.

There was no relief from the emotional pain.

He mentally reached out, his mind touching that of his host in a gesture of reassurance that neither of them were truly alone in this place. It was as much for his benefit as it was for Noah.

_- I feel the same, Noah, but there is nothing that we can do here. We must try to save ourselves. -_

He allowed himself a momentary glance toward the end of the tunnel. He knew, without seeing, the grisly sight that awaited him. Just around the corner, lying in a rumpled pile, were more mangled and lifeless bodies of the people he called friends. They were the closest thing he had to a family. His heart ached at the thought as a pang of regret tore through his frayed soul. He felt his stomach turn alarmingly and swallowed hard to keep from losing the contents of his lunch.

Swaying, he forced himself to take a deep breath.

Noah stirred deep within his mind, urgency temporarily replacing grief as shock gave way to the need for survival.

_- I'm sorry. You are right, Mal, we need to hurry. Someone is approaching! -_

The sound of distant footsteps was growing closer, the voices no longer muted by the cries of the damned and the dying.

- _Jaffa_! -

But Malek was no longer listening. He had allowed Noah's grief to penetrate his own heart and now he found that he didn't have the strength to go on. Still slumping against the cool crystal in exhaustion, his eyes were drawn to his hands, and something inside of him snapped. In the dim light that permeated the smoky darkness, the blood that stained his hands seemed unnaturally bright. They were a testament to his failure, a needless reminder that the world was crashing down around him and he had no one to blame but himself. He was the base commander and should have seen this coming. There had definitely been signs. Big, bold, glaring, neon signs as his friend Jacob would have said.

Jacob.

His best friend.

Was he alive or dead? Had he and Noah already stumbled over Jacob's body in the chaos and not even realized it?

_- Malek? -_

The pressure of angry tears, hot and traitorous, pricked dangerously at the corners of his eyes, but he refused to disgrace himself by allowing them the leisure of falling. There would be a time to mourn the dead and kill himself with guilt later. Perhaps he should die in this wretched place, but Noah's was an innocent life that he could not justify forfeiting. He wiped his hands frantically against his pants, trying vainly to rub away the blood, to remove the stain of crimson betrayal before it seeped any further into his soul.

Smoke billowed into the corridor from the direction they had been fleeing, burning his lungs, and he coughed as more tears, this time from the smoke, threatened to fall. Malek pushed away from the wall and rubbed an unsteady hand over his eyes. Whether it was to remove the blood, dirt, and tears, or in a futile attempt to remove the sight of so many kindred souls needlessly slaughtered, he wasn't sure. In the next instant, he found his feet moving again, drawn onward like a moth to a flame by a new sound, and the dim light of hope.

Stumbling through the vanishing darkness, familiar voices rang through the dim light now penetrating the tunnel as he drew closer to the gateroom. He carefully stepped over and around chunks of broken crystal and prone bodies on the floor. Some faces he knew, some he could no longer recognize, and some he refused to look at.

Involuntarily, his mind flashed back to his office and the first few moments of the attack. One second he was having a conversation with his second-in-command and the next second the man was lying on the floor, a pool of blood rapidly forming beneath his head as he gasped for breath. The light in the tunnels flickered dimly, casting everything into shadow.

He saw himself crawling towards the wounded man, hands pricked bloody by shards of crystal before he reached his friend. He shifted around the mass of fallen crystal until he could gently lift Tavin's upper body into his arms, cradling his head in the crook of his arm. His friend tried to speak but only a small stream of blood came rushing from his trembling lips.

In mute horror, amid the screams that echoed around them, Malek watched as one of his closest friends died in his arms. For a moment, his mind froze. The world faded away around him and he could hear nothing but his own heart pounding wildly in his ears. He couldn't move, couldn't breathe, couldn't hear his host screaming at him to run. Then everything happened in an awful rush of fear induced adrenaline that he hardly remembered sprinting from his office and into the heart of a disaster zone.

Shaking his head to clear it, Malek forced all thoughts of Tavin out of his mind. He needed to focus on the present if he had any hope of getting out of this alive. Rounding a corner, he was nearly blinded by the welcome light from a swirling vortex. Sweet relief coursed through his veins as his heart beat out a fretful cadence in time with the fearful voices of his surviving comrades. On the verge oblivion, he watched in awe as they vanished, two at a time, through the event horizon. But to where?

_- To hope. -_

Hope? Was there such a thing in the midst of such destruction? Could there really be sanctuary waiting for them on the other side? Or were they merely walking from one disaster straight into another?

"Time to go!"

There was a moment of confusion as he stepped forward, following his friends to salvation, and then there was pain. Acute and indiscriminate as a staff blast ripped through his side from behind.

His hands immediately flew toward the blinding pain. Warm blood oozed through his fingers as he stared dumbly at the wound as if trying to figure out what all the sticky red stuff on his hands was. Time and space melted together as he sank slowly to his knees. His vision blurred on an approaching figure, though be it friend or foe he could not say for sure.

_- Don't leave me. -_

Thoughts that mirrored his own echoed dully though his mind. Dreams of far away lands, and voices of dead friends swirled together in a seething mass of blinding blue fading leisurely to black as he finally crumpled completely to the floor.

Lights danced in front of his eyes, blocking the face that was fighting to surface. Eyes of the most majestic green smiled at him from beyond the darkness, beckoning him onward. He reached out but his hand closed on empty air.

Suddenly he felt strong arms slide around his waist. The floor disappeared from beneath him as pain shot through his side, up his spine, and behind his eyes. Effortlessly, he was drifting toward the light.

_- We die free. -_

His words or someone else's, it didn't matter in that moment. The truth of the statement rang clear in his mind, infinitesimally negating the horror of the moment. It followed him into the blissful embrace of negative space, a small comfort amid the agony of defeat.


	2. Chapter 1: Broken and Helpless Things

**Notes**: I'm a firm _Divide and Conquer_ denier. It never happened. Also. This got a lot more angsty in spots than I anticipated. My heart was not meant to go through overtime and the characters in this story inevitably suffered more than they would have because of playoff hockey. Oops.

* * *

The bed was warm and he was comfortable for the moment. There was no pain, only a dull burning sensation in his side. He didn't want to open his eyes for fear of what he might see. He didn't want to take in the strange surroundings and begin the long process of accepting that the life he knew was over. He couldn't face the loss of so many friends. Their faces swam beneath his closed eyelids and he couldn't help but wonder who was alive and who was buried beneath the rubble of the ruined base. He didn't want to accept that, for now, this strange new world might be, no, would be, home. Wherever they were, he did not want to be here.

He lay perfectly still, hoping that sleep would come again and let him rest for a while longer, but the lights that burned orange behind his closed eyelids were hard to ignore, and the soft sounds of mechanical equipment gently humming nearby rendered sleep impossible. He finally gave up with a small, irritated sigh.

_- We can't hide forever. -_

The thought elicited another sigh, this one weary and resigned, as he cracked his eyelids against the harsh white light that glared down upon him. Cautiously, he lifted himself up onto his elbows, hissing as the burning sensation gave way to a stabbing, white-hot pain and a wave of nausea crashed over him. With his teeth clamped tightly together, he tried to breathe as evenly possible. Counting to ten, he gingerly lay back against the fallen pillows until the pain had completely receded and he was able to breathe normally once more.

Opening his eyes for the second time in as many minutes, he grimly took in his surroundings. Cataloguing everything and committing it to memory in excruciating detail. Just in case. It was always best to be prepared for the worst in every situation.

Grey walls. Bright lights. The strong scent of offensive industrial cleaners clinging to every pore and surface within the cot filled room. Primitive technology dotted the small space. Soldiers in green and blue with arm patches bearing familiar symbols were standing guard by the doors. Healers wearing long white coats shuffled from bed to bed with no nonsense smiles and trays filled with strange instruments and bottles.

_- Earth. Jacob has brought us to his homeworld.-_

He should have known Jacob would bring them here. It was his home and a reasonably safe haven from the System Lords because their mutual enemies could not penetrate the barrier that the Taur'i had placed within their Stargate.

For now, they were safe. It was a small comfort at best.

He rubbed his tired eyes and, pushing aside the nausea he swung his legs over the side of the bed and tried to stand. As soon as his feet hit the floor the rest of his body followed. White lights danced in his vision as hands grabbed his shoulders and pulled him back onto the bed. Seconds ticked by as he fought down the bile in his throat and the pain in his head. He heard people rushing around his bed, picking things up and putting them back down. Voices asked him questions that he could not understand and which sounded hollow and far away. Then, in an instant, everything cleared and his vision returned.

A small woman stood before him in a long white coat. She produced a penlight from one of the pockets and shone it in his eyes, sweeping it back and forth.

"Malek?"

He stared at her, trying to remember where they had first met when it struck him like a ton of bricks. She was the same doctor that he had met at the Alpha site several months before. It had been under similar circumstance as these, though none less regrettable, and he was ashamed that he could not remember her name. His memories of her were fuzzy at the moment, no doubt because of the splitting headache that was currently eating away at his brain. He knew that this was, without a doubt, the second time that he owed her his thanks and quite possibly his life.

_- Janet_ - whispered his host_. - Her name is Janet_. -

Janet greeted him with a shake of her head, her hands sinking deep into the pockets of her white lab coat as she gave him the once over with her eyes. His hand instinctively reached for the thin sheet, feeling awkward and embarrassed at the realization that his clothes were missing and he was wearing nothing but a thin hospital gown.

"I was wondering when you would come around. You've been unconscious for days. How are you feeling?"

"I am well." The words were out before he could stop them, tasting every bit like the lie they were. "I have been through far worse," he hastily amended.

Janet gave him the same sweet smile that she had so many months ago, choosing not to comment on his bravado.

- _She's probably used to men pretending like they don't feel pain. -_

Guiltily, he looked away. "There is a small amount of pain. Nothing I cannot handle." He amended in a small voice, adding a _thank you_ so quite he wasn't sure she had heard him until she nodded.

"Well, all of your tests came back normal and your wounds seem to be healing just fine. There is nothing more I can do for you." She reached out and placed her hand on his shoulder. "Whenever you are ready, you can leave the infirmary. The Tok'ra have been issued temporary quarters a few floors above this one." She nodded toward the door to indicated one of the soldiers standing guard. "That is Lieutenant Greene on the left. Just let him know whenever you feel like you're ready and he'll escort you to your quarters."

"Thank you."

"Of course And Malek?"

"Yes?"

"Take it easy."

He was accustomed to giving orders so he knew one when he heard it. He grinned sheepishly at Janet as she moved away to check on her other patients. He glanced toward the door where Lieutenant Greene stood, silently appraising him.

_- This is going to be a long day. -_

_- Yes. - _Malek agreed. - _And the first thing we have to do is find our pants. –_

Noah snickered and wished him luck before retreating and leaving Malek alone in his own head.

Malek let his gaze wander around the room, taking in the scene before him but not really believing it. None of it felt real yet.

But it would.

There were at least two dozen beds and cots shoved into the small space, many of them jammed together to make as much room as possible. He could not see all of their faces, and he did not see any of his close friends, but he did spot one of his security officers in a bed near the back corner along the opposite wall. The man looked pale and near death.

Discouraged and disillusioned, Malek relaxed back into the pillows and stared at the blank ceiling. His people were on the brink of extinction, closer now than ever before. This was a blow that he knew, deep down, they would never recover from. They were standing at the crossroads now, blood on their hands and dirt on their faces, beaten and broken, and they had to make a choice. As a group, as the last of an entire race, whether to make a final stand or fade away into obscurity in the hopes of preserving what was left.

What was left?

He did not know and he might not know for a long time. They would be counting their losses and their lucky stars for a very long time. The one thing that he did know, for sure and for certain, was that there was no real choice when standing at the crossroads of extinction. They had to go forward because there was no going back.

Not from this.

Not this time.

-c-c-c-c-c-c-c-c-

It took ten minutes of scalding hot water to dull the pain and wash the memories of the past forty-eight hours from his mind. The faces of his fallen comrades played on constant repeat, clinging to his soul and rending it farther beyond repair, but it was the faces that he did not recall from the doomed base that hurt most of all. Asa and Noelle, Waya and Bran, Jalem and Pasha…their names became a litany in his mind, a tiny spark of hope amid a sea of despair. They were alive. They had to be. They were the only friends he had in the world and he could not face losing them. Not now. Not when he had already lost so many.

Absently, he ran the pads of his fingers across the tender flesh of his side. The wound itself was mostly healed, thanks in part, he had learned from a Taur'i healer, to a hand device welded by Selmak after their arrival. He was thankful for that and for a whole hell of a lot of luck. A few inches in either direction and he would have been dead.

The water had long since turned to ice, but neither Malek nor Noah seemed to notice until a loud knock broke through their reverie. The knock was unwelcome, but they were far too tired ignore whoever was at their door for long. There was a nine in ten chance that whoever it was would not soon go away.

He stepped out of the shower, and with a towel wrapped around his waist, quickly searched the small space for a clean change of clothes. The shirt and pants that he pulled from a small set of drawers beside the bed were black, depressing, but a welcome change from the chilly air of the room. He ran the towel over his hair, trying to make himself at least somewhat presentable as the insistent knocking continued. Dragging on the clothes, his fingers fumbled with the closing device for a few seconds. Buttons _and_ zippers? What where these people thinking?

Frustrated but decent, he grabbed the doorknob and jerked open the door.

"'Bout damn time! I've been knocking for over an hour!"

"Jacob," he said, and the relief was palpable in his voice.

Malek fought the urge to grab Jacob by the neck and hug him. Neither man was wild about hugging and it would have been awkward. Instead, he merely gave his old friend a tired smile.

"Damn Malek," Jacob said, pushing his way past him and into the room, "you look like hell."

Malek closed the door in Jacob's wake and turned to face him. "Nice to see you, too, Jacob."

Jacob grinned, but the mirth that usually accompanied such a gesture was woefully absent. His eyes were dark and cold.

_- Sad_ - thought Noah and Malek had to agree.

Another chill shot down Malek's spine.

_- Here comes the bad news. -_

But it didn't. At least not immediately.

"How are you doing," asked Jacob, concern written all over his face. "We thought we'd lost you for a little while. It was kinda touch and go with the hand device."

"I'll be fine. Thank you."

Jacob nodded with a dismissive wave of his hand. "Selmak and I are just glad we didn't have to carry out on our threat."

"Which was?"

"To kick your sorry ass if you died on us."

Malek quirked an eyebrow. That was so Jacob and under different circumstances he would have laughed at his friends attempt at humor.

Sobering slightly, Jacob sank onto the edge of the bed. "Really though, we're glad you're okay. We've lost so many, to lose you, too….it would have been a hard blow to stomach."

The lump forming in Malek's throat was sufficient enough to prevent him from responding. It made swallowing hard. His chest suddenly felt heavy and his veins were filling up with fear. Instead of looking his friend in the eye, he turned and slowly made his way over to the bed, sitting on the opposite side and wanting nothing more than to crawl under the covers and fade into merciful unconsciousness. The mattress gave pleasantly as he lowered his bruised and battered body onto it, and for the second time, he could think of nothing but darkness. Darkness and screams that would haunt his dreams for months.

"Malek?"

He refused to look up, not wanting to see the expression on Jacob's face as he asked his next question. He grabbed a pillow and fiddled with one of the corners. Not knowing what to do but needing to do something. He hated this feeling of helplessness almost as much as he hated the feeling of responsibility that was quietly gnawing at his heart.

"How many did we lose," he asked quietly, not really wanting to know the answer but resigned to the inevitable.

Jacob exhaled loudly through his teeth, a low whistle that heralded the bad news. "It's easier to count how many we didn't lose, Mal. Fifty came through the gate with us. Three died before the medics could do anything to help them. Twelve remain in critical condition and the rest have enough bruises and cuts to paint a pretty impressive picture with."

He paused to allow Malek time to absorb the news, waiting for a barrage of questions, but Malek remained stoic, quietly waiting for his friend to continue. He had questions, a plethora of them, but for the moment he was more comfortable sitting in ignorance. One question in particular had the potential to completely destroy him.

His host snapped deep within his mind and he shook off the idea; forcing the image forming in his mind's eye into submission before motioning with his hand for Jacob to carry on before that train left the station.

"We assume all those left behind at the base are dead. The Jaffa had infiltrated the tunnels and the surface was crawling with them, any Tok'ra who made it topside were probably killed on sight. All in all, that's nearly two hundred people unaccounted for and assumed dead."

"Two hundred." Malek dropped his head into his hands, and swallowed hard. His fingers brushed harshly against a cut above his eye and he felt it burn.

"Yeah, and add to that the fact that half of the High Council members who were at the base are still unaccounted for and you've got one hell of a mess."

"What about our operatives aboard the motherships," Malek asked.

Jacob shook his head. "We have no way of knowing if they were compromised."

Jacob took a deep breath as if preparing to unload some heavy burden, some news even more horrific than that which he had just learned, but he was abruptly silenced by a man's voice echoing throughout the base.

"Unauthorized incoming traveler."

The two men exchanged worried glances.

"You don't think…" began Jacob as he started for the door, moving far faster than Malek had seen in quite a while.

"The symbols for the Taur'i are well known among the Goa'uld," said Malek, tossing the pillow aside and reluctantly following him through the open doorway into the already crowded hallway.

"But…they wouldn't, even if they know where we were, they wouldn't follow us here."

"The Goa'uld want us dead, Jacob. All of us. At _any_ cost."

Jacob turned left and Malek stuck close to his back to keep from getting lost in the labyrinth of hallways and stairs. This was the first time that he had ever set foot on the Taur'i base and he was hopelessly lost.

The closer they got to the gateroom, the more oppressing everything seemed. It felt like the air hallways were closing in on him and he found it difficult to breath.

This was it. This was fate finally catching up to them.

To be honest, Malek knew a thing or two about fate. First of all, she was a royal pain in the ass. He'd been bitch slapped by her enough times in the past to know that you don't tempt her without good cause, and you never want to get your hand caught in the proverbial cookie jar if you do. Rule number one in Malek's big black book of don'ts when dealing with fate: slip in quietly and pray to any deity that'll listen that she doesn't notice you're there until you're long gone – preferably with more than just miles between you and her. Years work well, though not in all circumstances.

In Malek's mind, the Tok'ra had played chicken with fate one too many times, and now they were paying the piper as fate's evil grinning twin reared its ugly head. Which was another thing that Malek had learned the hard way: karma is bitch.

Now here they were, caught between fate and karma, struggling for every inch, every breath, tooth and nail, just for the right to exist. The word doomed came to mind. Along with a surfeit of other less civil and unrepeatable words.

Words much like the ones that Malek heard Jacob mutter as they reached the control room. The event horizon flared to life, visible only for an instant before the metal iris barred it from view.

"Who's knocking, Siler," asked Colonel O'Neill as he hurried into the gate room, his obnoxious yellow civilian polo shirt blinding everyone in his path. Jacob's daughter was hot on his heels.

"There is no iris code, sir, and there are currently no teams off world."

Jack heaved a petulant sigh and shot the two Tok'ra a knowing glare. "I bet I know who it is."

"Jack." Jacob warned.

O'Neill shook his head in agitation and stuffed his hands deep into the pockets of his slacks as he rocked back and forth on the balls of his feet.

- _Impatient, fool._ -

- _Be nice, Mal, he's our host now. - _

Minutes passed in tense silence, the uncertainty and apprehension palpable within the small confines of the control room as each individual mentally played through a series of worst case scenarios for what lay beyond the obstructed event horizon.

Still, no signal came and it wasn't until several loud thuds bombarded the iris that the apprehension in the room became thick enough to whittle with a machete. Another thud resounded and the same horrifying thought flitted through the minds of everyone present. Surely those thuds…they weren't…no…they couldn't be…people. Could they?

"Sir! Receiving a distress signal. It's the Tok'ra."

Jack exchanged a fleeting glance with Jacob, his eyes glossing over Malek before grabbing the microphone. "Open the iris. Defense team to the gate room."

"You two expecting some company?"

Malek tried to ignore the mordant tone of Jack's voice. He tried not to let it bother him too much, but ultimately failed and retorted with an equally sardonic no.

In the time it took for their brief exchange, the iris had opened to reveal the pristine surface of the swirling blue vortex. Suddenly, staff blasts crashed into the walls above the soldiers' heads and seconds later a young man with disheveled brown hair hurtled through the gate. He slammed face first into the ramp and rolled over twice before springing to his feet and jumping the remaining distance from the ramp to the floor where he collapsed into a dusty, crumpled heap.

Malek was already in motion by the time Jack thought to stop him. He descended the stairs and rounded the corner into the gate room precisely as the figure on the ground began to stir.

"Jalem!"

"You know him?" O'Neill's voice echoed behind him in stark disapproval.

"He's one of our operatives," said Jacob tersely as Malek knelt by his fallen comrade's side. "He's also a member of the High Council."

"Jalem, what happened? Are there others? Are they coming?"

Cradling his left arm gingerly against his chest, Jalem slowly nodded. "Yes, I thought they were right behind me," he said breathlessly.

As the vortex rippled, more Tok'ra spilled through the event horizon amid sporadic staff blasts. Malek hauled Jalem to his feet and moved him toward the door to make floor space for the new arrivals. Within minutes, a steady stream of Tok'ra was moving hurriedly away from the gate, all covered in dirt and in various states of duress and injury. Some supported those who couldn't support themselves; others wore hastily applied bandages and stunned expressions of disillusionment as they moved from the ramp, careful to avoid the injured as they cast wary glances at the row of heavily armed soldiers.

Then, without warning, the gate suddenly disengaged.

The gateroom was overflowing with Tok'ra, many spilling out into the hallways. A small contingent of medical personnel descended upon the wounded, deftly moving in and around them.

Malek tried to stay out of the medic's way, offering his aid where he could and moving away when he wasn't needed. Finally, he made his way back to where Jalem sat on the floor, another man kneeling beside him.

"Martouf, it's good to see you alive."

Martouf nodded and Malek noticed the gash on the left side of his face was bleeding profusely. He reached behind him and stole a cloth from a nearby medic. Martouf accepted it in silence and pressed it to the wound.

Malek knelt beside side Martouf and looked back and forth between the two men, cataloging their injuries. Other than the gash on his face, Martouf appeared relatively unharmed. The same could not be said for Jalem. His arm was definitely broken, there was a shard of crystal sticking ominously out of his leg, and it appeared that his not so soft landing on the ramp had left a nasty and distinctive bruise on his face.

All things considered, it could have been so much worse.

"What happened?"

"The System Lords attacked without warning." Said Jalem, his voice low and infused with pain. "Somehow they knew the exact location of the base. Many Tok'ra died in the tunnels when the symbiote poison was released by the Jaffa. Those of us on the surface managed to fight our way to the gate and Martouf brought us here."

"Whoa! Wait a minute," interrupted Jack, who was suddenly standing over Malek's shoulder, "are you telling me that the System Lords, every last one of them, knows that you came here. To earth." He jabbed his finger at the gate to make his point. "Here. With us."

Martouf nodded in a no nonsense way. "That is correct, Colonel."

Jack shot Martouf a glare that would have melted a glacier. Malek was sure that if Martouf had been a lesser man he would have withered under such a stare.

Hoping to head off a potentially nasty scene with the Colonel, Martouf quickly began to explain. "Please understand Colonel, we had no other option. The System Lords have attacked all of our bases. Yerin was our last refuge. The last of the Tok'ra had fled there. When the Goa'uld attacked, we had nowhere else to go."

He may as well have said nothing because the murderous look on Colonel O'Neill's face did not change. In fact, it was not a stretch to say that it got darker, more dangerous. The vein throbbing in his temple was near to bursting by the time Martouf finished.

"So what you're saying, Marty, is that this," Jack motioned to the crowded gateroom where Tok'ra were overflowing into the hallways and beyond, "this is it. All the Tok'ra are here. On Earth. Every. Last. One."

Martouf nodded once. "Yes, Colonel O'Neill. As far as I know, we are all that is left of the Tok'ra resistance."

Malek watched Jack took a deep, calming breath to steady himself, and he had a sneaking suspicion that they would all be doing that a lot in the near future.

"We have nowhere else to go, Colonel. We've come to seek sanctuary among the Taur'i."

It took a moment for Malek, and everyone else in the gateroom, to take in the Martouf's last words. The gravity of the situation was more than they could grasp all at once. More than likely, it would take days, if not weeks for the full ramifications of what had just occurred to fully sink in. In the meantime, however, there were wounded to be taken care of. Fixing things that could be fixed was one way of coping, if not dealing, with a situation. Even the Colonel seemed to recognize that.

"Okay," said Jack with a long, begrudging sigh, "let's get the wounded looked at and start finding temporary quarters for everyone else. I'll call General Hammond and tell him he needs to get back here ASAP."

A chorus of "yes, sir" followed his words and men and women in green and blue uniforms started milling about, helping people to their feet and dividing people into groups.

Malek watched Colonel O'Neill give out a few more orders to several different men with a sinking feeling in his stomach. If what Martouf said was true, if all of the Tok'ra were now on Earth, then the System Lords had finally won.

The resistance was broken.

He studied Jack carefully, waiting for him to say something else, to address him or Jacob, but Jack was silent, surveying the gateroom with a grim expression on his face. He looked tired.

Given the Colonel's track record with the Tok'ra, both professional and personal, he could understand the man's reaction, as well as his reluctance. In his experience, the Tok'ra had caused him nothing but trouble, though he refused to see that that particular road went both ways, and the idea of giving them sanctuary while the Goa'uld were on the war path and going for the death blow, was nothing short of absurd. Suicidal even.

Malek was thankful that Jack was not the man who would ultimately make that decision. He had no doubt that Jack was a good man, an honest and caring man at heart, but his experiences clouded his judgment when it came to Malek and his broken band of brothers.

Jacob would not have brought them to Earth if he thought Jack and the men in charge would turn them away. No doubt that thought was in the back of his mind as he dialed in the gate coordinates and led them here. It was not the Taur'i way to turn aside the desperate and the hopeless. Their weakness for helping broken and helpless things was legendary.

Malek stood slowly, searching the sea of Tok'ra for familiar faces, searching for one face in particular.

- _Where is she, Mal? -_

_- I don't know, Noah, I don't even know if she's alive.-_

The mere thought of such a reality made him feel sick and unsteady.

"Malek?"

Jacob was standing near his elbow, a grim expression on his face, "I know what you're thinking, Mal, and you're wrong."

"How do you know what I'm thinking, Jacob?"

His friend gave him a wry smirk. "Because I know what I would be thinking about if I had a mate and I'm here to tell you that she is alive."

"Tell me, Jacob! How do you know this? Where is she?"

"She's in the infirmary. Wounded, unconscious, but very much alive. Janet says that she's in no immediate danger and that she'll live, Mal."

His heart skipped a beat at the news. "Noelle."

"Come on," said Jacob, slinging his arm around Malek's shoulders, "You won't be able to see her until things have calmed down some. The medics are still moving people in and out of the infirmary. We'd just get in the way if we tried. Let's go get something to eat, you must be starving."

He winced. There was nothing more that he wanted to do than go find his mate to reassure himself that she was alive, but Jacob was right, as much as he hated to admit it, he would only be in the way if he tried to fight his way through the mass of wounded. He would just have to wait, even if it slowly killed him inside.

Jacob was right about another thing, too. He was starving, but he didn't think he would be able to eat. That sense of guilt and doom that had settled in his stomach earlier had turned to ice and was even heavier now. He didn't know whether to collapse onto a bed and sleep for the next three years, or throw a few chairs in anger and frustration.

Either way, he doubted he would feel any better.

* * *

Comments are ace.


	3. Chapter 2: A Light in the Dark

Sleep was a nonissue. His mind refused to shut off and no matter how soft the bed was, no matter which way he turned in the darkness, he could not get comfortable.

Discouraged, he rolled out of bed and rummaged around in the dark for his shoes. Five minutes later, accompanied by Lieutenant Green, he found himself standing outside of the infirmary, arguing quietly for passage with a very assiduous nurse. She stood eye to eye with him and would not let him forget it. She had denied him access to the infirmary all day, stating in no uncertain terms that the patient he wished to see was in no condition for visitors. To further expound upon her point, she jabbed him, not so softly, in the chest with her index finger, giving him an indisputable _no_ that left no room for discussion.

Exasperated, he resorted to begging, a feat that did not come easily.

"_Please_. _Please._"

She huffed at him, giving him a look that told him that one more word from him and he would end up in the infirmary as a patient himself instead of as a visitor.

He was about to admit defeat when a door clicked shut from somewhere behind him and Janet Frasier approached with a sympathetic smile. Unlike the large woman before him, Malek had to look down at the chief medical doctor. He had the upmost respect for the women, but at the moment, he could have shot them both with a zat for standing between him and his heart's desire.

"Malek, is there something I can help you with?" Her voice was gentle and even, questioning but not accusing as Patel's had been. It was obvious to Malek that she truly wished to help him, or, at the very least, placate him into silence somewhere far from her infirmary.

"Please, Doctor Frasier, there is someone I must see. I promise not to wake her. I just…I need to see her with my own two eyes. I need to know she is really here. Alive and whole. Surely you can understand that?"

Janet patted his arm lightly, like a petulant child being granted a reprieve, before giving him a small shove toward the door. Patel, the pitiless healer, still barred his way with a sneer on her face and her arms crossed across her chest in stark disapproval. He briefly wondered if the woman had a heart, and if she did, where did she keep it, but he dismissed the thought quickly, though it refused to die a quiet death.

"Doctor Frasier, I must disagree…"

"Disagree all you like, Patel, it won't do any harm to let him see her as long as he promises not to wake her."

Malek would have promised to the moon and back that he would be as quite as possible if it would have helped get him closer to his lover.

Janet grasped Malek's arm just above the elbow and he was surprised by the strength of her grip. She was very strong for such a small woman. Patel grudgingly stepped aside, and Janet guided him into the dimly lit infirmary where she pointed him toward the back wall. Another nurse stood beside a small cabinet with a clipboard and a broad range of sharp instruments that made him involuntarily cringe. She, too, shot him a disapproving look, but said nothing as he passed.

Walking through the maze of hospital beds and hastily assembled cots, he began to suspect that Jacob had been right when he said that the worst was not over. Many of the Tok'ra were hooked up to Tau'ri machines that beeped and whirled and flashed multicolored lights at him as he paused to take in faces and catalogue injuries. Here and there he spotted a familiar face that made his heart jump into his throat, and he said a whispered a hushed prayer to whatever deity would listen to spare their lives.

Eventually, he navigated his way to the back of the infirmary where the injured Tok'ra that had come through the gate with him from his small base were being kept as comfortable as possible while they waited...to live? To die? No one seemed to know for sure.

In the very back corner, in a cot pushed right up against the wall, a small figure, made even smaller by the vastness of the room surrounding her and the stark whiteness of the sheets pulled up to her chest, made his heart nearly stop in anticipation and trepidation. There were small tubes running from her hands to an unfamiliar machine beside her bed and another small tube ran across her face, under her nose, and was hooked behind her ears. She was alive, but not entirely whole.

Malek held his breath as he approached the bed, afraid for a moment to touch her, afraid that she might disappear if he did. His heart was pounding against his chest, his veins filling up with icy fear and uncertainty, and, just for a moment, he was sure that this was all a hallucination. He drank in her appearance with his eyes. Her left arm was bandaged and the bandage was slightly pink beneath the white dressing where the wound refused to staunch. A small cut ran the length of her left cheek, ending just below her ear, but it did nothing to detract from her beauty.

His eyes were drawn to her chest which rose and fell in a comfortingly normal rhythm and all of his momentary fear dissolved in a wild rush of relief. Reaching out, he brushed a stray lock of hair from her face and tucked it lovingly behind her ear, careful not to disturb the transparent little tube. Bending over, he placed a gentle kiss on her forehead. Her skin was warm and his heart leapt with joy and he was sure it would burst.

"Noelle." He whispered her name like a pray, his voice catching with emotion as the realization that she was alive finally sank in deep enough to hold meaning.

She was so beautiful. Her light brown hair fell haphazardly around her shoulders and was matted with dirt and dried blood near the nape of her neck. Her closed eyes were purple bruises in the dim light, and he half hoped that they would open and warm him like the morning sun inviting the dawn to break. He knew that they were as vibrant and green as the soft spring grasses on Noah's home world. He had never wanted her to open her eyes so badly and say his name before. He needed to talk to her, to confide in her all of his fear and misgivings, because he knew that she would know just what to say. She always did.

Quietly, so as not to wake her, he retrieved a short metal stool from a nearby bed and placed it right beside Noelle's bed, against the wall, and settled in for the night. He had no intention of leaving now that he was here. Nurse Patel would have to drag him from the room, kicking and screaming, fighting for every inch of floor space, if she wanted him gone.

He gently caressed Noelle's arm, the smooth skin as soft as butterfly wings, and he was forced to close his eyes against the stinging tears. If he could, he would trade places with her in a heartbeat. Less than a heartbeat. He would give his life, and Noah's, to save hers. Dying for the ones they loved was one thing that neither Malek nor Noah would ever hesitate to do.

His heart was heavy, his thoughts plagued with uncertainty and doubt. He wanted to protect his sleeping mate, to lie on the bed beside her and take her in his arms as she slept, oblivious to the tragedy their lives had become. He wanted to shelter her from the pain of lost friends, to guard her against an uncertain future, and tell her that everything would be alright.

Overcome by a sea of conflicting emotions, Malek allowed himself another cursory glance at the Tok'ra filled infirmary. The sight was enough to drive any man to grief.

Jacob believed that the Tau'ri government would grant their request for sanctuary but Malek was not as convinced as his friend. From what little he had seen of the Tau'ri, and from what little he had already gleaned from the few healers and soldiers he had come into contact with since their arrival on Earth, Malek was troubled about their acceptance. Tok'ra would adapt, but the Tau'ri harbored a deep and abiding distrust of his people, accentuated by countless incidents of conflicting agendas, ethics, and attitudes. The fact that his people often chose to sacrifice the few for the many did not win them any friends among the humans of Jacob's planet either. In fact, it was one of the main sticking points in their alliance, the elephant in the room as Jacob would say. Jack and his ilk believed in leaving no man behind, that one life was just as important as the next. They did not understand that sacrifices sometimes had to be made in order to ensure the survival of an entire race of people.

Then there was the problem of the System Lords. Even if the Tau'ri allowed them to stay for the time being, they would have to face the Goa'uld eventually. They could not hide here in shame and fear forever. Malek did not believe that the Goa'uld would try to follow them here and finish them off. It was enough for them that the movement was dead in the water and that the remaining Tok'ra had fled headily in the opposite direction with their tails between their legs. In their minds, they had won. It was over.

Malek was not sure what tomorrow would bring, a reality that he was used to, but in an entirely different situational state of being. Life among the Tok'ra had always been tumultuous and unpredictable, but he had always known that they could pick up the pieces and move on. Those days were over. As refugees he had no idea if the Tau'ri would throw them out and, if they did, what would become of the Tok'ra. He desperately wished he could tell Noelle that everything would be alright, but he couldn't, and he wasn't sure he would be able to for a very long time. The severity of their situation came crashing down on him in one massive deluge of clarity, and it was all he could do to stifle a choked sob. He felt inadequate and lost.

He had failed. He had failed the Tok'ra. He had failed his friends. He had failed Noah. He had failed himself. Worst of all, he had failed Noelle.

-c-c-c-c-c-c-c-

George Hammond was not pleased. That much was crystal clear and glaringly obvious to almost everyone present in the briefing room. It was past midnight and George had been fielding telephone calls and angry requests from members of the Tok'ra High Council for the past five hours. Now he was stuck in an emergency briefing and looking at a very, very long weekend.

The fact that he had made his weekend plans ages ago and was suddenly forced to cancel them because of the Tok'ra smacked of resentment. His grandchildren were visiting and he and his wife were supposed to take them to the zoo for some much needed downtime, but now he was back on the base, seething. His weekend was shot all to hell and his briefing room was overflowing with bickering Tok'ra. He wondered if they fought like this all the time, and how they ever got anything accomplished, and then he remembered that they had been fighting the Goa'uld for a millennium. The answer was disturbingly clear in his mind.

The volume of noise in the room was migraine inducing and was only escalating as members of the Tok'ra were trying to out shout one another in order to be heard. Tempers were beyond broken and nothing reasonable seemed to be able to dam them. Everyone had an opinion and everyone wanted to be heard. What had started as a civil discussion had disintegrated completely and in record time.

As much as he hated to jump into the middle of someone else's problem, his head could not take much more verbal abuse.

"Enough! That's enough, people!" he shouted over the din of flanged voices, hardly making a dent in the volume but getting the desired result all the same.

Stunned by the outburst, silence fell, and George Hammond suddenly wished he had kept his mouth shut as over a dozen sets of eyes turned to glare disbelievingly and contemptuously in his direction.

The general sat forward in his chair, lacing his fingers together on the smooth surface of the briefing room table, trying to stall for time to clear his head. He knew he would get nowhere with the Tok'ra by playing nice and being diplomatic so he took the direct approach. Straightforward was almost always the best approach in his opinion. There was no sense beating around the bush and hoping for the best. Might as well dive in head first and see what shook loose.

"I understand that this is a very difficult time for you all, but it does not help to fight over things that cannot be undone and cannot be changed. We want to help you. We do. I've spoken to the President and he's called an emergency meeting with the Joint Chiefs to discuss the possibility of your remaining on Earth for the foreseeable future. For now, we feel that the best course of action is to assess the situation on our end. I need to know how many Tok'ra survived, the number of wounded and dead, and how much of the council is still intact."

"We are still counting our losses, General Hammond, however, we do have a preliminary head count," said Martouf, sitting forward and proffering him a small gray data pad.

George nodded appreciatively and accepted the offered item. "Good. That's a start."

The other Tok'ra were returning to their seats, agitation etched upon their faces, and George wondered briefly how long it would take for the situation to blow up again. He glanced down at the numbers on the pad as Martouf began speaking once more.

"As of this moment there are roughly two hundred and thirty Tok'ra here. Fifty wounded – eighteen critical – and twenty dead. Over half of the Tok'ra council is unaccounted for," Martouf paused to glance around the room, "all of the council members that have been accounted for are currently before you."

"And Supreme High Councilor Per'sus?"

"Not before you."

George nodded and fought the childish urge to roll his eyes at Martouf's comment, "and you are sure these are the last refugees? There won't be anymore? What about your operatives aboard the Goa'uld Motherships? Do you know anything about them?"

Several of the Tok'ra around the table stiffened at the question, obviously uncomfortable with the idea of being refugees on such a technologically inferior planet with a group of people who detested the idea of blending.

Martouf, obviously sensing that the situation was quickly spiraling out of control again and hoping to smooth over the situation without further incident, dove back into the conversation.

_Give the man credit, _thought George somewhat ruefully; _he's trying his damnedest to keep things together._

"Yes, General Hammond. As Jalem said earlier, the locations of all of our smaller cell bases were compromised and all of our Tok'ra operatives were forced to abandon them. Everyone fell back to Yerin to regroup just before the second wave of the Goa'uld attack. Those left behind on the planet when we fled through the chaapa-ai would have been killed by the Jaffa. As for our covert operatives, we have no way of knowing whether they were discovered. If they were, then they are decidedly dead."

George dropped his eyes back to the data pad in his hands to avoid the grim expressions and inquisitive eyes. This was bad news, but the SGC had prepared for the worst after the first wave of Tok'ra stumbled through their gate.

A few moments passed in silence and then a Tok'ra George did not know, but recalled as a member of the High Council named Feor, sat forward.

"I know that we have requested asylum on your planet, however, I think that it would be best if we were still allowed to travel through the gate in search of a suitable planet to establish a new base."

"What good would that do us?" Retorted another council member, "we have no crystals to create tunnels with and there are too few of us to risk open exposure."

Several other members spoke up and George was momentarily fearful that another row was about to commence, but the Tok'ra restrained themselves, choosing instead to air their disagreements with one another in a more civilized fashion this time around, and after a moment which Hammond could only describe as bizarre in which Martouf seemed to be silently conferring with his symbiote, Martouf explained that such a mission was futile but nonetheless worthy of investigation, if for no other reason than to give his people something productive to do. They were going stir crazy sitting on their hand and waiting for answers that would not come.

George was also inclined to agree because he had no idea where he was going to find room to accommodate such an overwhelming number of refugees. His base was simply not big enough to shelter them all and quarters on the surface were out of the question.

The nagging headache that tugged behind his eyes became a full blow migraine at the thought of trying to keep his people from starting trouble with the Tok'ra. He knew, without a doubt, that tempers were already running on a short fuse and that the SGC was inviting trouble from powerful outside foes by harboring the Tok'ra. However, at the moment it was not the outside forces beyond his control that worried him, but forces from inside the mountain itself. His people did not take kindly to the snake in the head concept and he was already afraid of what would happen if the President allowed them to stay. Too many people with too many conflicting agendas and morals all locked up beneath a mountain with heavy weapons. It was a recipe for disaster and there were enough explosives in the armory to blow a crater the size of Iceland straight through the middle of the Rockies.

-c-c-c-c-c-c-c-

Malek watched as the temperature in the briefing room dropped several degrees. Tensions were riding high as emotions boiled just beneath the surface. Sooner or later, the peace that General Hammond had managed to broker between the opposing sides of the council was going to shatter and they would take a huge step back. Nothing would be accomplished. It had not always been this way, but in recent years the council had fractured and the conflicting sides could not find a steady middle ground. Outbursts like the one he had just witnessed were occurring with more frequency and Malek tried to stay out of them as much as possible. Jacob called him a fence sitter, but Malek preferred to think of himself as one rational mind among many irrational ones. Such a position made it difficult to accomplish anything when no one wanted to hear reason.

A feeling of cold dread settled in the pit of his stomach as he eyed each of the other council members in turn. He could not put his finger on what was bothering him, couldn't name the feeling that was squeezing his heart too tightly. The air in the room seemed too hot, too thick. It wasn't the inappropriate explosion of emotions; it was something much more troubling than the unbecoming behavior of his friends.

Looking around at the sea of faces, he saw that he was not the only one who felt a disturbance in the air. He caught Martouf's eye, only for a moment, but what he saw there amplified the nauseous feeling, turning it into a seething Gordian knot of jumbled emotions and doubts. The same thought whispered through the air between them. Martouf gave a brief, barely discernible nod which Malek reluctantly returned before swiftly averting his gaze, intent on focusing on anything except what had just passed between himself and the other Tok'ra.

All around him he saw signs of defeat and exhaustion. The Tok'ra were weary. Battle worn to the point where they could hardly be bothered to care anymore. He could see it in their eyes, in the way they presented themselves, in the way they moved and spoke and slouched forward in their chairs. The Tok'ra were a proud people but there was not a speck of pride to be found just then. There were no smiles and no laughter. Both had died on the Tok'ra home world.

In his mind there was nothing left to say. Standing abruptly, Malek headed for the door and, to his surprise, no one called him back.

He wandered aimlessly through the corridors of the base, his mind curiously blank for the first time in days. He concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other, and shortly after his hasty exit from the briefing room, Malek found himself in the commissary.

The commissary was usually dead at this time of night. Occasionally, a scientist or two, having lost track of time working on some fantastic new piece of alien technology, wandered into the mess hall in search of sustenance. The less extraordinary and most common reason to be in the mess hall at two in the morning was insomnia. Lately, there had been a lot of that going around on both sides of the divide.

Sam, one of the aforementioned scientists, kicked the vending machine in frustration as it ate her dollar without recompense. Her stomach rumbled in protest and Malek could not help but smile. He had never been around Jacob's daughter much, and never for an extended period of time, but he felt like he knew her very well. Jacob talked about her constantly, as any proud father would, and Malek had heard more than a few stories that he was sure Sam would have committed murder over rather have them told to a complete stranger such as himself.

"Hey kid, what are you doing up at this time of night?" Asked Jacob suddenly from behind Malek.

Malek inhaled in frustration, fully aware that Jacob had followed him on purpose.

Jacob's daughter turned around with a bright smile. "Dad. Malek. Hey. I was just getting a midnight snack."

Jacob dropped into an empty chair. "Forgot to stop working again, huh?"

"Dad," said Sam, her tone exasperated as she pulled a few coins out of her pocket. "I don't _forget_…"

Jacob shook his head and held his hands up in mock defeat. "Okay, okay."

"Either of you want anything?" Sam asked, holding out her hand to show them the coins.

"Yeah, how about one of those Hersey bars," Jacob said with a mischievous grin. "Malek, you want one, too? Malek wants one, too."

Typical Jacob. He didn't even wait for a response before plowing ahead with an answer. Malek had no idea what a Hersey Bar was, and he wasn't sure he would enjoy it, but he knew that Jacob would not take no for an answer. He lowered himself into a chair adjacent to Jacob as Sam indulged her father and bought three chocolate bars. She handed one to Malek and sat down across the table from him.

Malek turned the short brown package over and over in his hands before ripping it open down the seam. There were several rows of chocolate, further sectioned off into small bricks that could be eaten one at a time. He broke off the first row of bricks and then snapped off an individual brick from the row. It was sweet, infernally so, and it melted slowly and delightfully in his mouth. He decided that he liked it almost instantly. He broke off another brick, savoring the smooth texture and rich chocolate taste.

Jacob and Sam were deep in conversation beside him and he listened absently.

"Have you spoken to Mark?"

Jacob shook his head, but remained silent. That was a sore topic of conversation. Though he had made amends with his son, the relationship remained rocky. Sam, obviously wanting to keep her father in a good mood, did not press the matter and began talking about his grandchildren instead.

"Emily started kindergarten last week. She was so excited. Mark said she refused to take her backpack off after they bought. He said she wore it at the dinner table and practically tried to sleep with it on."

Jacob grinned, "How does she like it?"

"Mark said she loves it. Her favorite part is riding the bus back and forth."

"Like father like daughter," said Jacob, happier than Malek had seen him in quite some time. Talk of his grandchildren always perked him up.

"How's Kyle?"

"Oh, Kyle is learning to play hockey. He tells me that he likes it, except for all the equipment they have to wear. I think he has the most penalty minutes of any kid on the team." She laughed at the thought, "I guess hot tempers run in the family. Somehow I missed out on that."

"Thank God for small favors," Jacob chuckled in agreement.

Malek listened to their happy chatter for some time. Jacob inquired about whether Mark and the family were planning on celebrating Thanksgiving in Colorado with Sam. Sam said no, she was going to California to see them. She glanced in Malek's direction with a curious expression on her face.

"Perhaps the General would be able to get permission for you and a few of the other Tok'ra to join us. It would be a great opportunity for you guys to see a little bit of our world and learn about some of our more important traditions."

Malek was about to tell her that he would relish the prospect of meeting the rest of Jacob's family when a small group of Tok'ra entered the mess hall.

Martouf slid innocently into the chair next to Sam as if he belonged there and Sam blushed in spite of herself as a small smile crept across her features. Peering up from the remainder of his chocolate bar, Malek caught the shadow that descended briefly across Jacob's face, though it was so fleeting that Malek was almost convinced that it had been a trick of the light.

"Jacob?"

There it was again, and this time there was no mistaking the frown that darkened his eyes and pinched his face. Glancing sideways, he noticed that Martouf wore a similar expression of displeasure.

When Jacob next spoke, it was with the distinct voice of Selmak. "What has happened?"

Martouf shook his head slightly, maintaining an air of silence. It seemed to Malek that the temperature in the room seemed to plunge with each empty second that passed. Malek glanced at the clock on the wall. Two thirty. Across the room, a small crowd of Tau'ri soldiers had gathered at an empty table for a small snack.

Eventually, Martouf sat forward, his gaze intent on the small group of base personnel a few tables away. "There was an incident earlier this afternoon." He nondescriptly inclined his head in the general direction of the small assemblage, "a minor fight broke out."

Malek's ears perked up. He swallowed the last of the chocolate and turned to face Martouf. From the rigidity of his spine, he was willing to bet that it was more than just a _minor_ fight.

Sam was starting at Martouf, clearly concerned. "A fight? What happened? Please tell me that no one was injured."

Martouf placed his hand on Sam's arm. "It was merely a verbal confrontation, Samantha. However, there were several bruised egos."

Malek had known Martouf a long time, long enough to know that the man was not telling them everything he knew, and he tried to catch his eye but the other man was steadily avoiding looking at him.

Malek crushed the empty chocolate wrapper in his hand. This was exactly what he was afraid would happen. He had to find a way to keep the Tok'ra and the Tau'ri from lashing out at one another in their frustration, but between the disapproving look on Selmak's face and the sadness on Martouf's, Malek knew that this was only the beginning. Too many people on the base shared Jack's view of the Tok'ra. They were sitting on a powder keg. All they needed was a spark.

-c-c-c-c-c-c-c-

Malek was dead tired. He had spent half the night staring at the ceiling, tying himself in knots; the other half was spent sitting beside Noelle's bedside with sporadic bursts of sleep overtaking him every now and then.

His back ached from lying bend over the edge of her bed half the night and his head throbbed slightly from the lack of food. Feeling sick, he had chosen to forgo Jacob's invitation to join him at breakfast, deciding instead to spend the quite time desperately trying to put his finger on where this feeling of foreboding was originating from and why. Obviously, the verbal scuffle the day before was weighing heavily on his mind, but that was not what was troubling him the most.

If the Tau'ri kicked them out on their asses, he knew they would pick up the pieces and make it all work somehow. It would be difficult but they would not just lie down and die. The dilemma wasn't where they would sleep tonight, but who would be sleeping with them.

It had started as a small itch at the back of his mind and had grown into a sneaking suspicion which, after the last seventy two hours or so, had blossomed into a full blown conviction that there was indeed a spy within the Tok'ra ranks.

Whoever it was had access to some pretty top-secret-high-level-need-to-know-council- clearance-only kind of information. The kind that would, and had, brought the Tok'ra to their knees and crawling to their nearest allies for asylum.

Which meant one thing: whoever the spy was, Malek knew him. Interacted with him on a daily basis, most likely exchanged pleasantries with him, and, quite possibly the most horrifying thought of all, might even call him friend.

It was enough to make him feel physically sick.

Noah, ever a comforting presence within their shared mind, tried to point out all the flaws in this thought pattern. He punched as many holes as he could in Malek's theory, stating that if a spy could infiltrate their ranks, he or she wouldn't necessarily have to be a member of the council. The Goa'uld were sneaky little bastards, they could just as easily obtain information by skulking around and tapping into data pads when no one was looking, as to sitting on the council day after day and hoping that the councilors would actually stop their petty bickering over trivial matter and get down to business. In fact, in Noah's opinion, his theory was much more sophisticated than Malek's. Plus, it sounded cooler, too.

_- You brood too much, my friend.-_

Malek took Noah's gentle chiding in stride, knowing that he was grateful for the help, and the distraction. He was trying to see the situation from every conceivable angle. No variable was allowed to escape his scientific evaluation and he had to admit that Noah had a point.

His mind ran full speed ahead, tossing about names of suspected spies and just as quickly tossing them aside as improbable.

_- You worry about the spy -_ Noah said as Malek splashed water on their face from the sink in their small bathroom. - _I'll worry about Noelle. -_

Malek wrapped his host in a mental hug, his gratitude filling the moment. It was impossible for him not to worry, but Noah's offer was touching and well-intended.

_- I can't help but worry about them. They're all we have left. If something were to happen… -_

He didn't finish the thought. He didn't have to. Both he and Noah felt exactly the same way.

A soft knock at the door startled him from his reverie and Noah pulled back once more, leaving Malek alone to face the day and their visitor.

_- Coward.-_

He heard Noah laugh, a sweet sound that had been absent for too many days. Truth be told, Malek hadn't realized just how much he missed their playful banter until now. He gave his host a playful push, but Noah held tight to the proverbial doorframe, refusing to be pushed fore.

Casting a last desperate glance at the mirror, Malek ran his fingers through his hair as he strode slowly toward the door.

_- Let's just get this day over with_. -

"Jacob."

His friend nodded and gestured for Malek to follow him.

They walked toward the briefing room in companionable silence, two uniformed guards with identical blank expressions bringing up the rear. He had promised himself that he was going to do everything in his power to keep the peace between his people and the Tau'ri. He knew that they could live together and work together as friends. It would take work but Malek was prepared to put in the effort. He only hoped that the council would listen to what he had to say and act upon it before the situation was too far gone to be salvaged. As the elevator closed shut with a tiny metallic click, he inhaled slowly and looked deep inside for the strength to make it through the day.

He only hoped it was deep enough.

-c-c-c-c-c-c-

The briefing room was mostly empty as Malek and Jacob entered. General Hammond and SG-1 were already seated along with Martouf, Delek, and Jalem.

As Malek and Jacob settled into the two remaining chairs, General Hammond wasted no time in getting right down to business.

"I just got off the phone with the President." He announced. "The good news is that he has made the necessary arrangements for you to stay on Earth until a suitable new home world can be found. The bad news is that you will not be permitted, under any circumstances, to leave the confines of this base. I know that this is not an ideal situation for anyone. We are doing our best to locate somewhere safe to send you, but in the meantime I need the full cooperation of your people. I can promise mine. I've spoken to my people and there will be no more incidents like the one that occurred yesterday."

Everyone sitting at the table nodded in agreement that this was acceptable news.

Satisfied, General Hammond turned his attention to Malek. "Son, I've been watching and the way you interact with your people. They all seem to trust you to make the right decisions for them and you are the one person that all of the Tok'ra seem to listen to the most. I'm going to need your help here to ensure everyone is on the same page or this whole situation is going to blow up in our faces."

Malek shifted uncomfortably in his seat and his mind involuntarily flashed back to the confrontation that had occurred on the Alpha site. He was not the highest ranking member of the council currently residing at the SGC, but he was a competent leader and it was true that many, if not all, of the Tok'ra had looked to him for assurances and his leadership in the past few days.

"I have already spoken with many of them, General Hammond, and I can assure you that everyone is in agreement. We will make the most of our situation here and there will be no more incidents."

"Good."

Malek relaxed, happy to have put the altercation behind them and relieved that the President had granted their request for sanctuary. They could finally begin to assess the damage to the movement in earnest and begin the process of healing. It would not be easy but his people were a resilient group and they were used to adversity.

"We have utilized as much empty space as possible to accommodate the large number of Tok'ra refugees on this base. Two of our smaller empty labs have been converted into barrack like sleeping quarters and everyone has been provided with the basic essentials: clean clothes, personal hygiene items, and blankets. Is there anything that your people need that we have not thought of, Malek?"

Malek was thoughtful for a moment. He frowned at his hands, sifting through the numerous amounts of complaints that he had heard over the past few days. He decided that none of them seemed worthy of repeating at this juncture.

"No, General, we are grateful for your continued hospitality."

Martouf caught his eye across the table and Malek was startled to note that it was Lantash who was in control. Lantash was staring at him intently and, for a moment, it seemed that Lantash would speak to him, but he changed his mind. Malek shot him a questioning look and Lantash shook his head. Whatever it was, it could wait.

General Hammond did not notice the subtle exchange between the two men. "There is another matter which we need to discuss."

Malek returned his attention to the General, distracted by Lantash's actions, disturbed by his unspoken words.

"Several of your scientists have requested the use of one of our empty labs for research purposes. I'm inclined to grant their request but I insist on full disclosure. This is my base and I run a tight ship. Were our positions reversed I am sure you would do the same."

Malek nodded, already expecting this. "Of course, General Hammond. We understand that this is your base and we will abide by your rules. I am aware that Aldwin and Anise have requested a space to continue their research and I will inform them that they are to keep me apprised of their activities and findings."

General Hammond seemed satisfied with his answer. "In that case, I'll authorize my people to allow your scientists access to the empty lab. I will expect daily reports from you."

Malek allowed himself a tired smile. "That will not be a problem, General Hammond. We are most grateful for everything that your people have done to aid us."

"That's what friends are for," said Jack, speaking for the first time and giving Malek a wry smile.

Malek felt his spine straighten involuntarily. The sincerity in Jack's voice was matched by his displeasure that Malek and the Tok'ra would be staying at the SGC for the foreseeable future. Malek returned Jack's wry smile with one of his own, refusing to allow the man to get under his skin. He knew first hand Jack's contempt for the Tok'ra, and he knew that he would never be friends with the man. Somehow that did not bother him. After the misfortunate incident on the Alpha site and the trouble on Pangar, Malek was resigned to the fact that Jack mostly hated him.

-_ "He is not a happy camper." - _Said Noah, far too amused for his own good.

_- "Well, he can pitch his tent right next to mine." - _Retorted Malek in a slightly more acidic voice than he had intended.

Noah laughed. - "_I think we've been around Jacob too long, Mal, we're picking up his terminology."_

Malek turned to scrutinize Jacob's profile. They were indeed picking up on his lingo, and perhaps some of his attitude, though they that had far too much of their own to need any more.

- "_At least we're in good company,"- _said Noah approvingly.

- "_Indeed."_ -

The conversation was flowing around them but Malek did not find it particularly interesting. Trivial matters were discussed and he offered his opinion at all of the appropriate times. After what seemed like an eternity, the General stood.

"Jack, my office, the rest of you are dismissed."

Malek stood, too, and tried to catch Lantash's eye again but he was already engaged in a conversation with Major Carter. He watched as Lantash placed his hand on her arm and whispered something in her ear. Sam nodded and started for the door, Lantash right behind her. Malek watched them leave with a bemused expression on his face. He knew from passed conversations with Lantash that Jacob's daughter had always been somewhat reluctant to form any sort of relationship with him and Martouf beyond the formal bounds of friendship because of her mixed emotions toward them. However, it looked to Malek that change was in the air.

-c-c-c-c-c-c-c-

Janet Frasier had allowed Malek to haunt the infirmary for the last few days without question, but her curiosity had finally gotten the best of her. It was clear that the woman in the corner bed was important to him, most likely his mate.

She approached him quietly, under the pretense of offering him a bottle of water and maybe a little comfort. Pathetic, she knew, but she wasn't sure how to approach the man otherwise. He seemed distant and unapproachable, and her memories of him from the Alpha site were not the most positive. However, she refused to judge him based on one meeting. Malek was truly an enigma and she wasn't sure what to make of him from one moment to the next. It was hard to reconcile this Malek with the Malek from the Alpha site. Everyone deserved a second chance and she was determined that this was his.

She had been watching him come in and out of her infirmary, always with the same look of grim determination. It broke her heart a little every time she saw him leave in defeat but she did not want him to see how much his hopeful vigil tore at her heartstrings. Still, some patients were different; some drew her in from the get-go and made her care no matter how much she tried to distance herself from her work, such involvement only made it more difficult when she lost them. Unfortunately, this was one of those times when she found it particularly difficult to remain distant and detached.

Malek was hunched over the edge of the bed, eyes closed, breathing slow and deep. The fingers of his left hand were loosely entwined with the woman's. Janet hated to wake him but she was looking for answers that only he could provide her.

She spoke quietly, "Malek?" When he did not respond she gave his shoulders a gentle shake.

"Huh? Wha-?"

He sat up slowly, rubbing the sleep from his eyes and his hands roughly over his face. "Is something wrong, Dr. Frasier?"

Janet paused, momentarily shocked by the sound of the man's voice. It was soft. Pleasant. Human.

She inclined her head to the side and watched as Malek's host blushed as he realized his mistake too late. "And you are?"

The man cleared his throat. "Noah."

Janet gave him a pleasant and reassuring smile as she offered him the cool bottle. "Here, Noah, drink some water. You need to stay hydrated."

Noah gratefully accepted and obeyed. He took several long swallows before acknowledging her presence once more.

In the intervening moments, Janet sat down on the edge of the bed, her eyes drifting momentarily over the attractive features of the female. She looked so peaceful and yet beneath the surface Janet knew that she was fighting for survival. She didn't need to be a doctor to know that her chances of waking up were becoming more and more bleak with each passing day. Even the Tok'ra had their limits.

"What is her name," she asked softly, never taking her eyes from the woman's face.

Noah sat forward, his hand ghosting absently across the woman's arm. "Noelle. Her symbiote is called Pan."

"She is very special to you." It was not a question.

Noah swallowed hard, clearly struggling with something, before divulging what Janet had already guessed. "Yes. She is my mate."

Janet had had more than one conversation with Sam regarding the concept of love and mating among the Tok'ra, but she still could not quite fathom all the intricacies of such a relationship. Love was complicated enough with only two hearts involved.

Before she could get herself into trouble with her inherent bias, Janet steered the topic to safer ground. Janet considered herself open-minded and the last thing she wanted to do was offend Noah by accidently saying the wrong thing because she did not fully understand his relationship with, well, anyone.

"What is she like," she asked in an attempt to keep the conversation as light as possible and still satisfy her own bubbling curiosity.

A grin tugged at the corners of Noah's lips when he thought about his mate. Janet could tell that he loved her very much and she wondered, not for the first time, how it all _worked_.

"Noelle is quite and kind of shy, but she can always see the good in people, even when they can't see it in themselves. She's got this infectious smile. It's impossible to envision that anything could possibly be wrong with the world when she smiles. And when she laughs…"

Noah trailed off and Janet looked from Noelle to Noah. Noah's face was pinched, his eyebrows drawn tightly together and his lips pressed into a thin, hard line. There were copious amounts of love and heartbreak etched in every line of his youthful face. It was written in the sadness of his deep blue eyes and in the way he slumped forward in his chair, his hand holding on to hers so tightly, like his last anchor to Earth.

"I'm sorry, Noah." She reached out and placed her hand on his shoulder, willing him some of her strength.

He didn't smile, didn't look her way, but he mumbled a soft thank you that nearly broke her heart. She found that couldn't stand to see him like this, and she did something she had never done before. She broke the number one rule of medicine, at least in her eyes, and she lied.

"Noelle and Pan are going to be just fine."

Her words lacked the necessary conviction and they both knew that it was a lie. Only time would tell whether or not Noah and Malek would be saying goodbye to their better half.

Janet wanted to say something encouraging, something that would ease the pain, but she didn't know where to begin. She had seen her share of loss in the past. From a professional viewpoint, it was inevitable. People died everyday despite the nearly heroic efforts of doctors and nurses everywhere. From a person viewpoint, it was devastating.

She thought of all the Tok'ra who had died and those still clinging to life with every ounce of willpower they possessed. Then there were those Tok'ra, like Noah and Malek, who were alive and left with the waiting. It had to be nerve wracking. Noah wasn't just mourning the deaths of friends; he was mourning the likely loss of his mate, too.

A thought hit her then about a story she had learned in elementary school. It felt like a lifetime ago when she had sat crosslegged on the floor and listen to her teacher tell her and her classmates all the different stories about the Native Americans who had inhabited this land long before the white man. Some of the stories were good, and some of the stories, like this one, were sad but spoke of hope and new beginnings. It seemed oddly appropriate and she did not hesitate to give it voice.

"You know, Noah, there is a story here on Earth about this beautiful flower. It's an evergreen with the purest snow white petals and a golden center. It's called the Cherokee Rose. You see, the Cherokee are a race of indigenous people who lived on this land long before it became the United States. Legend has it that when American soldiers began moving the Cherokee people off their ancestral homelands, on what became known as the Trail of Tears, over a hundred years ago to make way for white settlers, the Cherokee mothers were distraught over the deaths of their children who died from disease and exposure and starvation along the way. The mothers languished so much that the tribal elders prayed for a sign that would raise their spirits and give them hope for the future. The next day, where the mother's tears had fallen, there was this rose, this beautiful white rose blooming and it was the sign that the elders had prayed for."

Janet took a moment to gauge Noah's reaction to the story. He seemed thoughtful as he turned the story over in his mind, no doubt trying to discern its significance. She sighed and squeezed his free hand with hers.

"I don't know what you believe, Noah, about life and death and life after death, but I will tell you what I know. I _know_ that somewhere there is a rose blooming for your Noelle."

Janet stood up and, as she turned to leave, she could have sworn she saw tears in his eyes and, maybe, the smallest glimmer of hope.


	4. Chapter 3: To Catch a Traitor

It had been two weeks since their arrival on Earth. Two very long, exhausting weeks by Malek's reckoning.

The Tau'ri had finally allowed the Tok'ra to accompany them through the gate in a joint effort to further their search for a new Tok'ra home world. In a way, it was a good thing that the Tau'ri had finally started to include them. It gave the Tok'ra something to do besides sit on their hands and hope for the best, but it was frustrating because the search had proved far more difficult than anyone had ever imagined. There were many abandoned planets, and a few primitive ones, but the council deemed none of them suitable for various reasons. It appeared to Malek that the Tok'ra were stuck on Earth for the foreseeable future. However, there was some good news that had come from the entire mess. Everyone on the base had settled into a holding pattern, and the painstakingly brokered peace between the two opposing sides seemed to be mostly intact with no new incidents.

Malek, despite his many protests, was unanimously voted leader of the Tok'ra refugees several days before. Since then, he had been sitting through briefing after briefing of operatives returning from the search for a new home world and he was beyond tired.

He was sitting in the main briefing room, slumped into a chair, barely taking in a word that was being spoken around him. Jalem, Malek's chosen right hand, was finishing a report on his findings and they were grim. He tossed the data pad containing his recent mission report onto the table and concluded with a discouraged sigh; Malek dismissed him with a wave of his hand.

He was tired, bone weary, and all he wanted to do was crawl into a warm bed and sleep for the rest of eternity. Sensing that such a scenario was not really a viable option, he went in search of food instead.

The people of Earth had a vast variety of refreshments on their base and the personnel ate well at meal times. It was one thing that both Malek and Noah loved about the Tau'ri. Noah had become very fond of the Tau'ri delicacy known as pudding, but only if it was cheesecake flavored, and Malek had to admit that he was partial to the blue Jell-O that Major Carter seemed so fond of herself.

Malek had neglected his stomach that morning and ravenous was a nice way of saying that he had been too long without sustenance, an error which he was all too happy to rectify at the noonday meal. The commissary was packed with Tok'ra and Tau'ri and the smells wafting through the room made Noah's stomach rumbling in long overdue anticipation.

_- We're not skipping breakfast anymore -_ grumbled Noah.

Malek agreed and grabbed a tray and got into line. He filled it with random things and retreated to a corner table where he tried to push Noah fore in order to concentrate on other things, but Noah would have none of it. He hated crowds almost as much as he hated the Goa'uld, and that was saying something.

Sighing, Malek gave up and grabbed his fork. The meatloaf was juicy and delicious, and the mashed potatoes and gravy were perfectly creamy, just the way he liked it. Malek was finished with his meal and halfway through his peach cobbler when he spotted Martouf stalking across the room toward him with a profound frown on his face.

The other man did not sit down when he reached the table. Instead, he leaned over the empty chair and rested his hands on the tabletop.

"Malek," rumbled Lantash, "I need to speak with you."

Malek swallowed his mouthful of cobbler. "Has something happened, Lantash?"

Lantash hesitated, glancing around the room as if searching for eavesdroppers. "No." He said simply.

"Then sit and talk," replied Malek, knowing as he said it that Lantash was not likely to speak to him here. There was something in his eyes, the same something that he had seen there during a recent briefing, and it troubled Malek deeply. To be honest, he had lost sleep over that look and what it could possibly mean.

"Not here," responded Lantash as expected. He straightened and waiting for Malek to stand up and follow him.

Malek looked sadly at the half eaten bowl of peach cobbler. "Can it wait," he asked.

"No."

Something sharp and cold twisted in his stomach and Malek pushed the bowl away. "Fine."

They exited the commissary just as Jacob and Sam were arriving. Sam shot Lantash a questioning look, but he ignored it.

"Where are we going," asked Malek, curious about the exchange, or lack thereof, between Lantash and Sam.

It appeared to the casual observer that Martouf, Lantash, and Sam were growing closer, spending a lot of Sam's off time together as well as working hours. It was rare to find them apart, especially at meal times, and yet, here was Lantash, leading Malek through the corridors and completely ignoring Sam. Something about it wasn't right, but Malek pushed it aside. It was none of his business.

When they arrived at Lantash's quarters, Malek was surprised to see Lantash lock the door behind them. The Tok'ra had never had use for doors and secrecy, but Lantash was obviously taking no chances with whatever it was they were about to discuss. It was a significant action on the part of Lantash and it did not go unnoticed by Malek.

"Sit down, Malek," he said, offering Malek the only available chair in the room.

Malek took it appreciatively and Lantash settled onto the edge of the bed. His brows were furrowed together and he appeared to be deep in conversation with Martouf.

Finally, he spoke. "You've been on the council for a long time, Malek, and we trust you, which is why we are bringing this problem to you instead of some of the other council members."

Malek nodded, already sure he would not like the direction in which this conversation was headed.

"I believe that you already know this, but I think there is a traitor in our ranks."

_- Straight to the point then. -_

Malek contemplated Lantash's words. He knew for a fact that there was a traitor; it was the only explanation that made sense. Malek had spent days, and most of his nights, trying to decide who the traitor was. Of all the Tok'ra, Lantash was least likely to be a traitor, and Malek had never entertained the idea that he was the one who had betrayed them. Years of serving and fighting beside him had taught Malek that he was trustworthy and devoted wholeheartedly to the cause.

He knew somewhere deep down that he could not describe that he could trust Lantash. "I fear the same."

"Do you have any idea who it could be?"

Malek shook his head. "No. But I do know that it has to be someone in a position of power, someone with access to top secret information."

"Someone on the council?" Asked Lantash quietly, the anger barely disguised in his voice.

"Yes," replied Malek, slowly, "someone on the council would have access."

"But not complete access," pressed Lantash.

"No, not to all the information they would have needed to coordinate an attack such as the one that nearly wiped us out. There are only two people on the council with that much access: Garshaw and Per'sus. I do not believe that either one of them would have betrayed us in such a manner."

"Nor do I," Lantash conceded after a lengthy pause, "that leaves us with only one possibility."

Malek swallowed hard around the tight knot in his throat. "Someone broke into the data pads containing the encrypted files of all of our top secret missions and the locations of all of our bases and shared that information with the Goa'uld. That same someone probably even helped coordinate the attacks."

Lantash looked grim. "But the question remains: who is this traitor."

"And how do we catch him?"

Lantash could not hide his surprise from Malek. "You think he came through the gate with us? That he is still among us? Why would he stay, why not flee back to the Goa'uld knowing that we would assume he was dead, a casualty like so many others."

Malek had given that possibility a lot of thought, but he believed it more likely that the spy had followed them through the gate and was biding his time before he could finish them off. Such a scenario would be devastating. Not only would he completely destroy what was left of the resistance, he would also bring down the SGC with it. The two greatest threats to the System Lords would be wiped out in one fell swoop. It was a daunting prospect and a bleak future that made Malek shudder and kept him awake at night.

"I do not believe that the spy has completed his mission. Many Tok'ra still live and he will not rest until we are all dead."

"You suspect another attack." It was a statement, not a question, and Malek merely nodded.

"Then we must warn the SGC."

"No," said Malek sharply. "The SGC would only make matters worse; they can't keep a secret to save their lives, unless it is one of their own. The spy would find out that we knew about him and no doubt act before we could stop him."

"Which he may yet do anyway," replied Lantash, urging caution.

"We need to do this ourselves, Lantash, and we must move quickly if we are to have any hope of catching the traitor before he kills everyone on this base."

"Samantha can help."

Malek considered that possibility. "Do you think she can be trusted to keep a secret?"

"Of course," said Lantash, slightly indignant.

"Then maybe you should bring her here so that we can discuss our options," countered Malek.

Lantash stood abruptly and crossed to the door without preamble. "I will return shortly."

Malek sank back into the soft cushions of the chair, weary and dispirited as the door clicked shut behind his friend. He rubbed his hands though his hair and exhaled slowly. If his theory was correct, flushing out the traitor might prove difficult. If the turncoat even suspected they were on to him things could get very ugly, very fast, and that was the last thing that Malek wanted. It was no longer just his people's lives hanging in the balance. The entire situation was delicate and had to be handled with the upmost care.

Malek thought of Noelle and Jacob. They were the two people dearest to him and the two people he could not stand to lose. The mere thought of a future without them turned his heart to brittle ice. There had been too many deaths already. Any more were unacceptable losses.

A hot surge of anger rippled through his body. If he ever got his hands on the traitor he would wring his neck for what he had done. Furious, Malek glanced to his lap where his hands were curled into tight fists, nails biting bloody red crescents into the tender flesh of his palms. He slowly flexed his hands, imagining them curling around the soft tissue of the traitors neck and squeezing the life from his body as he watched the light leave his eyes. It was a truly terrible thought but Malek did not feel the least bit remorseful. He would have time to feel guilty later; right now all that mattered was finding the traitor before there was more needless bloodshed. He only hoped that Jacob's daughter could aid them in their search.

He didn't have to wait long to find out. Ten minutes after he left, Lantash returned with Sam in tow. Sam perched on the edge of the bed as Lantash relocked the door behind them and then strode over to stand beside her.

"Martouf told me about your, umm, situation and I'm glad to help anyway I can."

"We need to catch a traitor," said Malek, "but we need to do it without tipping him off that we are searching for him."

"Martouf said that you thought the traitor had somehow hacked into the data pads containing all of the information regarding the locations of secret installations and coordinated the attack from those schematics."

"That is correct," answered Malek.

"How do you plan to expose him?"

Malek had pondered that quandary for so long that his head hurt just to think about it. The truth was that he did not know.

"I am uncertain of our next course of action," he admitted with a frown.

Sam seemed to expect this, no doubt from her conversation with Martouf, and she nodded thoughtfully. "I may have an idea, but I will need to bring a few more people in on this, namely General Hammond, if we are to have any hope of this working out in our favor."

Despite what he had said to Lantash about exposing the traitor themselves, Malek knew that they could not do it alone. Sam was right, but he did not want too many people to know.

"We need to keep this between as few people as possible," he cautioned, knowing that Sam was already off and running in her mind.

"Of course," she replied, "do you still have the data pad with all of the information on it?"

Malek nodded the affirmative.

"I'll need it," said Sam. She hesitated, "and you will need to convince the council that we've downloaded all of the information into our central database for safe keeping. Albeit in a secure file on a secure server."

Malek's eyebrows shot toward the roof, "you cannot do that."

Sam smiled, "of course not, Malek, but we have to make them think that is what we've done. You said yourself that you thought the traitor was a member of the council. If that is true, he will no doubt try to access the information using one of our computers. We'll catch him in the act."

Malek mulled the thought over. Sam had an interesting point, but he still didn't see how they would actually catch the traitor. "How is that going to help? I mean, how are we supposed to catch him hacking into your computer system?"

"Security cameras."

Of course. The entire base was under surveillance. It sounded like a solid plan to Malek and he readily agreed to give it a chance. "Alright. What do you need me to do?"

"Mention transferring the files to our database in the next council meeting. If there is a traitor such an opportunity is bound to shake him loose."

-c-c-c-c-c-c-c-

Malek sat in the security room next to Sam. His eyes hurt from staring at the small screens surrounding them. People moved in and out of the frames with purpose, each person having a legitimate reason for being wherever it was they were. It had been two days and no one had tried to access the nonexistent files on the computer in Sam's lab.

"Maybe the traitor isn't on the council after all," remarked Sam through a yawn.

Malek shook his head. He was willing to stake his name on it, he just wasn't sure if they were going to be able to prove it.

"Well, maybe they're bidding their time, waiting until we've let our guard down before they make their move. I mean, it would make sense since you didn't come straight out and say there was a traitor, just that the files were being moved as a precautionary measure because new information had been added to them. No doubt a guilty conscious could fill in the blanks as to why they were being moved."

As much as Malek hated to agree with her, he knew Sam was right. It could be a long time before the traitor moved against them. Despite his misgivings about an imminent attack, it would make sense for the traitor to lull them into a false sense of security before striking out.

He rubbed his hand across his eyes and let his mind wander toward the infirmary. He knew that Jacob had been hard at work with the hand device again with several of the severely wounded Tok'ra. Sometimes it didn't seem like he was making much progress as some of the wounds were far too sever to be healed by the hand device alone. Malek had tried to heal Noelle but there was so much damage that it was slow going, even with the hand device. For everything that it was, the hand device was not a miracle worker. Some wounds were beyond its capacity to heal completely. Time would have to do the rest.

"Malek!"

Sam's excited voice jolted Malek out of his stupor and he sat up straight. Sam was pointing at a small figure on the screen. He could barely believe it. They weren't going to have to outwait the traitor after all.

"Someone is trying to access the computer files. Let's go."

Sam was up and moving before Malek could react. The figure on the screen had his back to the camera and Malek could not tell who it was. Humming with nervous anticipation, he shot out of his chair and followed Sam out the door. They moved swiftly though the corridor, a small group of armed airmen flanking them as they reached Sam's lab in record time.

Malek crouched beside the closed door as Sam whispered instructions to the soldiers. When she turned to nod to him, Malek steeled himself for the man he was about to face, but when the door opened and Malek stepped across the threshold, zat in hand, he was completely unprepared. The man at the console whirled around, obviously stunned to find himself face to face with an armed contingent of Tau'ri soldiers.

"What is the meaning of this," he demanded incredulously.

Malek stared at the man in stunned disbelief as he scowled in his direction. His mind went completely blank for a moment before he finally found his voice.

"Delek?"

* * *

I've had this chapter, and the next one, mostly written for over a month, but I fell sideways into the Avengers fandom and, well, I kinda neglected this story. I'm not at all thrilled with this chapter, I found it difficult to write, but it is what it is. So. I hope it won't be so long between updates next time.


	5. Chapter 4: As the World Falls Down

Malek occupied the only chair in the room. His arms were crossed over his chest, distancing himself both figuratively and literally from the man who sat opposite him behind the cold, steel bars of the cell.

Delek glared back at him, his haughty blue eyes irradiant with hatred and suspicion. Finally, he cracked under Malek's longsuffering stare and shot to his feet. Malek watched him pace around the small cell, his hands clenching and unclenching into frustrated fists at his sides.

"Tell me why you were in Samantha Carter's lab," said Malek softy.

Delek spun on his heel, "I have already told you," he hissed, enraged further by Malek's calm demeanor.

"So, tell me again," Malek replied, unfolding his arms and learning forward in his chair. "And tell me why you have betrayed us."

"I am no traitor," spat Delek through the bars.

"Then why were you in Samantha Carter's lab trying to access restricted council files, Delek? Files which you have no business looking at in the first place."

Delek exhaled sharply, his eyes darting toward the closed door where two armed Tau'ri guards scowled at him. "I have nothing more to say to you."

Malek stood up, tired of playing games. "If you are truly not the traitor, then you have nothing to fear from telling me the truth, Delek."

"And how am I to know it is not you who is the traitor, Malek? You seem to have put yourself into a position of great power since the downfall of the Tok'ra. Who is to say you did not have this planned all along since you were the one in the position to gain the most."

Malek had to fight to keep his voice level, and to keep his hands from reaching out and strangling Delek through the bars. "I did not ask for this power," he said pointedly, "if I remember correctly it was you and the rest of the council who gave it to me, unanimously, after we arrived here."

"A mistake," replied Delek coolly.

"How so," inquired Malek, not really interested in the machinations of Delek's mind, but eager to move the conversation along now that he had him talking.

Delek shot him an indecipherable smile that fell somewhere between _pity_ and _fuck you_.

"Come now, Malek, we both know you have always wanted true power for yourself. Why else would you try so hard all the time."

"Because I believe in my brothers," spat Malek, nearing his own breaking point, "because I believe in the cause. I have only ever tried to do what I thought was best for the Tok'ra, to use my abilities to advance the cause and bring about the end of the Goa'uld. My only goal is, and has always been, the cause. Do not stand there and think me a traitor, Delek, when you were caught with your hands in the trap, dead to rights. You claim that you are innocent, that you are not a traitor, that your devotion to the cause has not wavered, fine, then prove it, Delek. Stop dancing around the truth and tell me what I need to know."

As his tirade ended, Malek momentarily regretted letting Delek goad him into such an outburst, but it proved to be an advantageous mistake on his part.

Delek sighed, long and hard. All of his hatred seemed to fall away in its wake and he sat heavily upon the bed in the cell, his hands clasped together in his lap. "I never thought you a traitor, Malek," he admitted after a moment's hesitation. "But I was not sure who to trust. So much has happened that it seemed odd that you would bring the Tau'ri into our business when we have never done so before." He paused, glancing up at Malek before continuing, "I thought it was suspicious behavior."

Malek nodded, not convinced.

"You do not have the rank to access those files without outside help. Who gave you their password?"

Delek hesitated again and Malek's own suspicious were confirmed. He was not working alone.

"You said, only moments ago, that you do not believe me a traitor and yet you withhold valuable information. Why? Your behavior speaks for itself, Delek. If you are not a traitor then I have never seen one."

Malek turned to leave, even made it half way to the door, but Delek stopped him.

"Fine. I will tell you what you want to know, but I want assurances."

"What sort of assurances," asked Malek over his shoulder.

"Assurances that my name with not be tainted with any of this madness."

Malek nearly choked on his scoff.

"So which is it? Are your hands clean in this or aren't they. You cannot seem to make up your mind."

"They are clean. I was merely following orders. I do not wish to be anyone's scapegoat when all is said and done."

"Orders?"

Malek turned around and walked back toward the cell, curious. "What orders? From whom did they come?"

"I was told to check the files, to ascertain whether or not you were truly giving top secret information to the Tau'ri and, if so, to destroy it. Your behavior struck a nerve with certain high ranking members of the council and they believed that you could not be trusted if you would indeed betray us in such a manner."

"You are telling me that it was your job to oust _me_ as the traitor?"

Delek nodded in confirmation.

"However, it appears that there were no files on Samantha Carter's computer after all. That was no doubt a rouse, but toward what purpose, Malek? You only managed to make yourself look bad in front of the council."

"No, Delek, my purpose were never to make myself look bad or arouse suspicion as to my loyalties, it was to draw out the true traitor on the council."

Delek scowled, "what makes you think there is one?"

"Intuition and a mountain of evidence."

"You have very little faith in your brothers, then," replied Delek acidly.

"No, I have all the faith in the world in my brothers, but I have neither faith nor tolerance for those who would betray us. Tell me, who sent you to check those files?"

Delek stood and crossed to the bars until he was standing face to face with Malek. Malek resisted the urge to take a step back, refusing to show any sign of weakness before the other man. Instead, he straightened to his full height, stiffened his spine, and lifted his chin. He could appear to be just as arrogant and self-assured as Delek.

Delek opened his mouth to speak, to finally give a name to the man Malek was trying so hard to catch, but at that moment there was a loud, thunderous explosion that rocked the base. Malek lost his footing as the ground beneath him shook violently, and he tumbled down, his hands flailing wildly to break his fall. The overhead lights went out, ensconcing the two men in darkness, before flickering back on.

Malek coughed as dust and bits of insulation floated down from the ceiling. He shook his head to clear it and reached out to grab the cell bars for support as he hauled himself into a seated position. Delek was lying in front of him, unconscious, a small ribbon of red flowing from his temple where he banged his head against the bars during the explosion. Malek reached through the bars and placed his hand on the other man's neck, checking for a pulse. It was slightly weak, but steady, and Malek sighed in relief.

"Sir, are you alright," asked one of the Tau'ri soldiers from the doorway.

Malek looked up to see him helping his comrade to his feet, both of them covered in dust and tiny red cuts.

"Yes, he said weakly, "what happened?"

"I don't know, sir," replied the same soldier, "I'll find out."

Malek shook his head and climbed to his feet. With one last glance at the unconscious Tok'ra on the floor, he followed the soldier and his wounded comrade out the door. Except for some ceiling panels and insulation, everything seemed to be intact as they trudge through the corridor. Military personal and civilian aids were dusting themselves off and picking up dropped folders and equipment. Malek stopped briefly to help a women clad in a white overcoat retrieve a scattered mess of papers before jogging to catch up with the soldiers he had been following.

As they rounded the corner into the corridor that led to the conference room, another loud explosion reverberated through the base. The shockwave sent everything not secured to the walls or ground, including base personnel, crashing to the hard stone floor. Darkness permeated the base as more dust rained down from the ceiling.

Malek found himself face down on the floor for the second time in as many minutes. This time, the lights did not come back on. Instead, the generators kicked in after several moments of absolute darkness. Yellow emergency lights blinked slowly to life above his head as security alarms blasted and flared red on the walls.

Malek pushed himself to his knees, his hands automatically going to his side, but there was no weapon there. He scanned the semi darkness, watched as more soldiers, armed to the teeth, poured through the corridor, all heading in the direction of the gate room. He quickly found his feet, aided by a young soldier who had appeared out of nowhere.

"What is going on," he demanded, grabbing the boy's shirt collar and hauling him toward the gate room.

The young boy gave him a terrified once over. "You're Malek, sir?"

"Yes."

"Sir," said the boy, looking relieved, "at 0800 hours, three boxes of explosives were discovered missing from the armory. The General had reason to believe that your theory was correct; there is indeed a traitor in your midst. He sent me to find you. That's all I know."

They had reached the entrance way to the control room. Malek let go of the young man's collar his eyes finding the man's name and rank above his shirt pocket.

"Where is the General now, Lieutenant Elliot?"

"I don't know."

_Great._

He doubled back, pushed past a group of soldiers, taking the stairs two at a time until he had reached the empty conference room above the control room. Entering through one door, he quickly sprinted the distance to the door that led to the base leader's office. It was empty, too.

The dim yellow lights guided him through the congested hallways as service men and women pushed and shoved past one another, all in a hurry to get to one place or another. No one seemed to know what the explosion was or where it had originated from.

Unsure of where to go, Malek hurried to the Tok'ra quarters to see if anyone there knew what the hell was going on. Jacob or Martouf, perhaps. They were closest to the Taur'i, trusted and loved by them; perhaps they could shed some light on the situation. Or, at the very least, point him in the right direction.

The corridors leading toward that section of the base were deserted. Live electrical wires hung dangerously from the ceiling, popping and crackling as he ducked around them. Rubble and debris obstructed the corridor the closer he got to the Tok'ra quarters. Smoke hung thick in the air, acrid and choking, but he forged onward, desperate to find someone who could explain the situation to him and desperate to know if anyone had been injured. Or worse.

As the debris in the corridor started to clear, he started to jog, and a horrible icy feeling began to form in the pit of his stomach. He couldn't quite put his finger on what it was that was causing his stomach to knot itself together. He broke into a run with every fiber of his being screaming that he must hurry.

He skidded around the corner and slammed into something hard. The wind was knocked from his body and he landed with an _umph_ in the middle of the corridor. His head slammed into the floor with dizzying force and white lights popped in front of his eyes.

"Malek?"

Shaking his head to clear it, Malek gingerly sat up. Jalem, his second in command, stood before him, his face ashen even in the dark lighting, the nasty gash across his forehead a tell-tale sign of something foreboding.

"Jalem, what has happened? Are you alright?"

His friend nodded slowly, thoughtfully. "There has been some kind of explosion in our quarters."

The icy feeling in Malek's stomach turned into a writhing mass of dread and he had to work extra hard to keep from being violently ill as a wave of nausea caused by the head trauma threatened to overwhelm him.

"An explosion?" His brain refused to work properly but then he remembered the shockwaves and everything came into focus.

"We must hurry," said Jalem, "we must warn the others."

Malek shook his head as Jalem reached out to help him to his feet. "Warn them? Warn them of what?"

Confused and blinded by his trust for the other man, he missed the glint of metal in the dim light.

"Of the next explosion," Jalem whispered into his ear. His voice, cold and calculated, was infused with an odd sense of elation.

The hair on the back of Malek's neck bristled ominously, but before he could utter another word pain scorched through his side as the metal blade in Jalem's hand ripped the flesh of his side asunder. He fell forward, instinctively grabbing at the wound as the knife Jalem had plunged deep between his ribs was ripped back out and jabbed back at him.

Malek throw himself sideways to avoid the attack but the tip of the knife grazed his chest, just above his heart. Warm blood oozed down his shirt and between his fingers as he clutched desperately at the more urgent wound in his side. Gritting his teeth against the pain, he saw Jalem out of the corner of his eye, lunging for his throat, going in for the kill. This time, he did not move away, but threw his hand out to catch Jalem's wrist mid-flight.

A bad move, though he only realized it belatedly.

Jalem's other hand came hard and fast toward his head and Malek had neither the time nor the means to dodge it as it connected with a sickening thud.

He forced himself to remain conscious through sheer willpower. Letting go of the wound at his side, he grabbed the Jalem's free hand so that both men were trapped by the other, arms crossed much like a game Noah had played with his brothers as a child. Only this was no game. Both of their lives hung in the balance in the space between them, and Jalem's grip was so tight around his wrists that Malek began to lose all feeling in his hands. Darkness began to encroach in his peripheral vision but he forced himself to retain his hold on the other man. His breathing was ragged and labored, and every breath felt as if the knife was being stabbed anew through his abdomen.

"What in the name of Egeria are you doing, Jalem?"

Jalem laughed. Long and hard. His muscles were taunt, ready for a fight, and his dark brown eyes were cold, hard – tiny slits of loathing and disgust. "It's amazing how trusting you fools are. Tok'ra change hosts when they cannot heal wounds so it is not uncommon for one of you to leave with one host and come back with another. And no one ever questions it as long as everything seems normal and the host appears to be willing and happy. All of which can be faked, as you know."

Malek struggled against Jalem but his grip was too strong and he was growing weaker by the second.

"_You_," he gasped, "you are the traitor. Why Jalem?"

Jalem scoffed. "Your friend, Jalem, he died long ago. I killed him myself but not before I learned all that I needed to know to take his place. I slid into his life easily, so easily it was laughable, and no one even knew that he had been replaced. Not even you, his best friend. It was all so pathetic but it made my job so much easier."

"And what was that," Malek asked through clenched teeth. His breathing was becoming more labored as the last remains of his strength was sapped by the flow of his life's blood onto the floor at their feet.

"To destroy you, of course. The Tok'ra are all about infiltration, but you obviously never realized that two can play that game."

Malek struggled to keep his tenuous hold on consciousness. "And Delek?"

Jalem laughed. "A puppet. His strings were easy to pull. He is devoted whole heartedly to the cause, that Delek, and he was prepared to do anything to ensure its survival. All I had to do was convince him that I thought you were a traitor, a danger to the remaining Tok'ra, and he was all too eager to help bring you to your knees. I knew you were onto me when you moved those files, and Delek was so eager to be a hero, so I used him as a diversion and you fell for it. It was too easy, Malek, far too easy. I don't see how you lot have survived as long as you have."

Malek felt all of the fight go out of him just as, without warning, another explosion rocked the compound. Both Malek and the man he knew as Jalem were slammed into the wall from the force of the blast. Jalem's grip was broken and the knife skittered away.

Malek knew that it was hopeless. He knew that countless more lives had been lost because of his stupidity. He had failed. He had completely and utterly failed. The Goa'uld had finally won. It was over. He had tried so hard and for naught. In the end, it had all been in vain.

Jalem, no, the Goa'uld who had stolen Jalem's life, had climbed to his feet and retrieved the knife. Malek, ever the warrior, understood that he was finally looking into the face of death. It was cold and indifferent and Malek found that he could not face it.

He closed his eyes; all the will to fight back was gone as his spirit was finally broken. But in the darkness, as he waited for the fatal blow that would end all the pain once and for all, he found his saving grace. Green eyes flashed beneath his closed eyelids, the sound of sweet laughter, innocent and light, floating on a gentle breeze, reverberated through his mind. The hint of a coy smile beneath silky brown curls breathed new life into his tattered soul and he forced his body to move.

Rolling sideways, his eyes snapped open just as the knife plunged downward. His sudden movement sent the Goa'uld off balance and Malek lashed out with his boot. The man tumbled forward, his head slamming into the unforgiving wall. He slumped forward and lay motionless, a small stream of blood staining the dull floor beneath his head. It was not an exciting end to such a dramatic confrontation, but Malek would take it.

Exhausted and weak, on the verge of collapse, he crawled toward the prone figure and knocked the knife away into the relative safety of the darkness. Just in case.

The sound of distant voices reached his ears, but he was already lost, drifting in a dark sea of unconsciousness that closed soundlessly over his head and swallowed him whole.

* * *

Please don't forget to review. Please and thank you.


	6. Chapter 5: The Ashes of A Tragedy

A heavy silence permeated the room and the hearts of most of its occupants. There were wreaths sitting on twin pedestals on each side of the gate ramp, and all of the soldiers wore dress uniforms to mark the somber occasion.

Malek stood at the base of the ramp, his hands clasped firmly behind his back to stop the nervous shaking he could not seem to quell since the fight with Jalem. He started blankly at the platform that had been erected for the final sendoff of their fallen brothers.

The room itself was packed to the brink with Tok'ra and SGC personnel. People spilled out into the adjacent corridors and watched from the conference room above. All in all the final count was staggering: fifteen people were dead including three Tau'ri and twelve people were injured.

The Goa'uld who had pretended to be Jalem had died a most unfortunate and mysterious death. The official version of his death as reported by the officers who found them in the corridor was massive head trauma due to a chunk of loose ceiling debris that fell on him. The real version had gotten lost somewhere along the way and Malek was not sure he wished to know the truth anyway. It was enough that the traitor was dead. His host would have died anyway from internal injuries according to Doctor Frasier so Malek did not let his conscience linger on the facts or what may or may not have really happened.

The damage to the base had been isolated to the Tok'ra's quarters though some of the shock waves had knocked out the power in other sectors and downed some of the unrestrained equipment. The Tok'ra had been reassigned quarters a few floors above the disaster area.

In the days following the attack, the Tok'ra had looked to Malek and Jacob for guidance and support. Malek put on his best face for his brothers, spoke words he did not believe in his heart but knew they needed to hear. He patiently answered all of their questions and addressed all of their concerns, including their concerns about Delek.

The investigation into Delek's part in the entire debacle had been brief, aided by Jalem's own admission of puppetry. Malek himself had questioned Delek again, much to Delek's chagrin, and he had concluded that the man had merely been stupid, not traitorous, in his actions.

In the end, it was all too much and Malek found himself awash in a sea of doubt, no longer sure who to trust, unable to tell friend from foe. Jacob and Martouf had both spoken with him about the events that had transpired in the corridor and they both agree that no matter how the Goa'uld had really died, it was for the best. Slowly, Malek had forced himself to stop looking for more traitors where there were none. It was a hard pattern to break, but he managed it with some help from his friends.

Malek forced his head out of the clouds and gazed around him, letting his eyes linger for a moment on Martouf. The other man nodded solemnly and Malek returned the gesture. Sam stood beside him, her arm brushing his, with a sad smile on her face that was meant for Malek. He nodded quickly at her then looked away.

"Arik tre-ac te kek. Tak mal arik tiak."

Jacob stood beside him, a pillar of strength and resolve as he spoke the traditional words of mourning moments before the event horizon flared to life. In the somber moments following the kawoosh, there was more silence. This time it seemed heavier, more oppressive, and Malek found it hard to breath.

There were no words to make ease the pain; no words of comfort or hope that could fill the empty void of sadness. The words he had heard from the Tau'ri over and over again _I'm sorry for your loss _were offered with sad eyes and firm handshakes, but to Malek they did not offer much of anything. Perhaps they were supposed to be words of comfort or compassion, a shared grief and understanding, but they were only empty words falling on deaf ears. What were they sorry for? They had not known his friends. Their world had not almost ended.

He knew that tomorrow the sun would rise with the same clarity of purpose as it always did, but Malek would never look at it the same way again. The bright lure of hope and renewal that followed the breaking dawn would never hold the same meaning as it had before. It was tainted with too much blood and death and betrayal to ever be as illustrious and beautiful as it had once been. The world around him had changed.

_Everything_ had changed.

Malek was lost in his thoughts again; his mind was a million miles away, sifting through the broken fragments of his life. It was time to begin picking up the pieces but this was one puzzle he was not sure he would ever see to completion. How were they to put their lives back together when they had been so completely and irrevocably shattered?

Plagued by such dark and dangerous thoughts, it was Noah who breached the divide of space and time and finally brought him back to the here and now.

_- Mal? The others have all gone. We should go, too. -_

Glancing around him, Malek found that the ceremony had concluded without him and he was standing alone in the middle of the empty gateroom. He stared for a long moment at the Stargate, the brokenness inside of him aching at the thought of ever going through it again. There was nothing out there for him but pain and death.

_- We are not alone, Mal. It won't be like this forever. Time does heals all wounds. The Taur'i have agreed to allow us to stay here for the foreseeable future. We're safe. We can rebuild somehow. -_

Malek was still at a loss, but he gave his host a mental hug for trying to cheer him up.

As he turned away from the gate, his eyes were drawn upward. SG-1 and Jacob Carter stood in the window of the conference room.

He saw sadness on Samantha Carter's face, uncertainty on Jack's, sympathy on Daniel's, but Jacob's was impossible to decipher. It seemed that anger flashed briefly across his features, but it was gone so quickly that Malek was not sure that what he had seen was nothing more than a trick of the light. He swallowed hard, unsure of what to do next. He considered joining them, but the thought of being with other people made his stomach twist painfully. He wasn't ready to face the world and the process of moving on just yet.

He had expected the traitor to be someone he didn't like, he had even wanted it, but he realized now that it was from selfish motives that he had wished betrayal on the innocent. What he would have given for the traitor to have been Delek or Anise. It would have been easier than facing the betrayal of his best friend.

_- He was not our friend. _Noah reminded him softly. _Jalem died long ago and our friendship with him. The stranger who wore his face was nothing more than a cowardly snake sent to rend us apart from the inside out. - _

Malek wanted to agree, more than anything, but the betrayal that he felt jammed most of his logical facilities and all he could feel was hatred burning like poison in his heart. Jalem or the Goa'uld, what did it matter? His friends, his family, they were all dead and nothing as frivolous as a distinction in allegiance would ever bring them back.

Movement caught his eye and drew him once more from his seething reverie, a state of being that he was more and more apt to fall into lately. He watched in stony silence as the group above began to turn away and disappear from the window. Once they were gone, the feeling of being completely alone, isolated from the rest of the world, the feeling that had plagued him since the start of the ceremony, settled with a heavy finality in the middle of his chest, echoed by the forlorn sound of a door slamming somewhere in the distance.

Heaving a sigh, he closed his eyes against the flood of emotions that torn at the surface of his carefully constructed control. Like a child, he willed it all away: the pain, the sorrow, the loss, and the reality of his current situation, but when he opened his eyes a few moments later, nothing had changed.

Lowering his gaze, he realized that he was not alone in the gateroom after all.

Neither Malek nor Noah had heard her enter. Malek had no idea how long she had been standing there, silently watching him. She was wearing the same black uniform that he was, minus the jacket. There was a vivid white scar on her cheek and her arm was still bandaged, but her green eyes were bright and clear. She was watching him intently, an inappropriate smile tugging at the corners of her lips.

She reached out to him, her small hand sliding perfectly into his much larger one. He found himself looking down at their intertwined fingers in awe. Her hand was always so cold but now it was the only thing he could feel in the entire room that was warm. She lifted her free hand and gently ran it along the side of his face, down his jaw. Looking up, he saw that she knew exactly what he was feeling because she felt it, too.

"Noelle." His voice cracked and before he could stop it he felt the sting of angry tears prickling behind his eyes.

His mate said nothing. She didn't have to. Instead, she stepped forward, her arms encircling his waist in a tight embrace, her head resting against his chest. He wondered briefly if she could hear his heart breaking. Her small hands moved in smooth, comforting circles on his back, and it seemed to him as if she was trying with all of her strength to keep him from falling apart at the seams.

He wrapped his arms around her small shoulders and buried his face in her soft brown hair to hide the tears that he could no longer deny.

If there was one thing that could ever being to heal his bruised and broken soul, it was their Noelle.

-c-c-c-c-c-c-c-c-

"I have some good news and I have some better news. Which would you like to hear first?"

Malek glanced up from his data pad to find Jacob beaming at him from the doorway of his office. He motioned for the older man to take a seat and Jacob wasted no time obliging him.

"What sort of news?" He asked cautiously. He knew better than to get overexcited by any news Jacob brought him. It was usually the mundane stuff such as: _We've been upgraded from decaf to regular for those of us who drink coffee. We're meeting in the main debriefing room today instead of the broom closet. There's going to be Meatloaf and Peach Cobbler on the menu tomorrow. No more olive colored BDUs; we get to wear the blues ones this week!_

"Well, you have to pick one first, Mal. Good news or better news?"

Malek rolled his eyes in a very childish manner. Jacob was rather fond of his games and he didn't like it when other people refused to play along. "Alright, if you insist, let us have the good news first."

Jacob's grin widened further and he held out his hand. Malek took the offered item and his curiosity shot up tenfold.

"This is a key card." He said, stating the obvious.

"Yes, it is."

"What does it unlock?"

"That would be the part one of the good news. It unlocks the elevator. You can come and go as you please now, Mal, and, tomorrow morning, you're going to get your first real glimpse of Earth's surface. That's the second part of the good news. You will be pleased to hear that the General has granted your request to go topside for a bit."

Malek stared at his friend in disbelief. He had been lobbying for weeks to get a glimpse of the Tau'ri's home world but General Hammond had stonewalled him at every turn, stating in no uncertain terms that the Tok'ra were not allowed to go to the surface.

"How did you manage this, Jacob?"

Jacob held up his hands, palms out. "Oh, don't look at me; I had nothing to do with it."

Malek allowed himself a smile as he turned the small plastic card over and over in his hands. He mulled over the possibilities it presented and stashed it in his pocket for safe keeping. Leave it to Jacob to pull all the right strings. He'd never admit it but he had everything to do with getting things done on the base. His name and his word still carried a huge amount of influence around the institution that was the Tau'ri military and he wasn't afraid to throw his proverbial weight around to get things done.

"Will Noelle be able to join me on the surface," he asked a bit too eagerly, hoping Jacob had thrown his substantial weight around for every one's benefit and not just his.

Jacob nodded, "yes. I'm sure she will be excited to hear the news."

"Of course." Malek was delighted himself. "So, what is the better news? I cannot image any news better than this."

The older man mock scoffed at him. "You, Noelle, and Martouf will be joining me and Sam for Thanksgiving this year. We're going to California after all to see my son. General Hammond has made all of the necessary arrangements. All you have to do is act normal, in other words, don't be yourself, pretend to be a normal human, and we'll take care of the rest."

Malek was unsure how to respond to this news. He had been denied access to the surface for so long that he had never imagined, even in his wildest dreams that he would be allowed to accompany Jacob and his daughter beyond the mountain and out into the world at large.

"Well, don't just sit there with your mouth hanging open, Malek, say thank you."

"Thank you," he parroted, still in shock. "Thank you."

Jacob shook his head, "not at all, my friend. I think we could all use a bit of a holiday after everything that has happened these last few months. Hell, I think we deserve a break."

_Understatement of the millennium, _thought Malek and Noah at exactly the same time.

* * *

Don't forget to read and review. Please and thank you.


End file.
